The Rebirth of a King
by Cloak of Shades
Summary: He's never found peace within himself to call himself a man. He's never found the solace of life that everyone around seems to have found. He's always found himself forced upon the ground. His wings have been broken and he can never again take to the sky. He is an outcast, the black sheep, the one who doesn't fit in. He… is me.
1. I wish I could fly

He's never truly found peace within himself to call himself a man. He's never found the solace of life that everyone around seems to have found. He's always found himself forced upon the ground. His wings have been broken and he can never again take to the sky.

It is a sad existence that he has lived his entire life. He's never been one to strike out against others nor has he been known to cause a panic in areas of peace. He's always been quiet, sitting patiently in the corner, waiting for his chance to shine and to prove himself a person of quality.

He is an outcast, the black sheep, the one who doesn't fit in. He… is me.

My name is Kiritsu Kaizer. I'm a high school student that has never really found a calling. I've been stuck in a perpetual spiral of grief and misfortune that can never be wiped clean. I've moved three times from school to school, hoping that my slate would begin anew but no matter where I go it always follows me like a leach on my back.

I've never known compassion nor have I ever felt like I truly belonged. My friends from long ago have left me and I've been labeled as the pariah of my school.

I am the plague, I am the disease. I am seen as an enemy that has to be stomped out. I don't belong nor will I ever be a part of the system. I don't mind this status. I don't mind this existence. Then again, it's not like I have a choice to being with. This life has been forced upon me and it shall live with me for the rest of my days.

This is who I am, but it is not what I wanted to be.

[High school Roof]

There is one man sitting on his back on top of the roof, next to him there is a small lunch consisting of a strawberry milk a PB&J sandwich and a bag of chips that isn't opened. He is staring at the sky, with his arms outstretched as if reaching for something or someone.

I give a deep sigh as I look towards the sky.

I find peace here when my depression hits an all-time low. I don't know what it is but I like to see the birds flying through the sky. I love to see the clouds and I love to see the shining sun pierce through the clouds as it reaches through to the mid-day.

"I wish I could fly." I say aloud as I continue to watch a flock of birds passing by.

Before I continued to admire the freedom the birds had, I instinctively rolled over to the right and just as I moved a white bird turd fell down right where I was laying down.

"Knew it." I commented before getting up.

"They're lucky I can't fly as free as them or I would so kick their asses for trying to take a crap on me." I groaned irritably as I started to make my way towards the door again.

As I looked up I noticed someone familiar standing at the door waiting for me. It was the class president.

Aoi Miyamoto, the class president was a pretty cute girl despite her only being 16. She had long black hair that matched her jet black eyes. She had just the right curves where they needed to be and she had a nice rack to boot. She was 5' 7" and she didn't exactly look too pleased with me.

"Class prez." I said as I almost walked past her.

She got in the way of me as I tried to walk past and down the stairs.

"I knew I'd find you here Kaizer-san. Why do you always insist on being up here during lunch? Every time you come back down you're always 5 minutes late to the next period." She started to reprimand me.

"You've got to take care of your future Kaizer-san, you need to be more alert to your classes and stop staring out at the sky so much. What is it that you hope to find by looking out at the window all day?" She asked me continuing to lecture me for my carelessness.

"It's a nice day today… isn't it?" I threw out the left field comment to throw off her train of thought.

"Eh? Uh… Y-Yes it is a nice day but that's not what I'm here to talk about Kaizer-san." She said trying to get me to focus again.

"Hai, Hai. I understand Miyamoto-san. I know that I need to pay more attention in class but I already know everything that they're saying and it's just boring…" I said trying to find a way to get past her.

"Yes but your grades would be so much higher if you applied yourself. Please, if not for yourself the do it for your family to make your grades better." She pleaded trying to make me see things her way.

I stopped paying attention to her after I heard the word "Family". She kept rambling on about me getting better grades and getting into a better school but I just didn't want to hear it. My family never really was something I wanted to talk about and in terms of conversation it was the one sure-fire way to make me stop paying attention.

This mono-tone conversation continued for another three minutes until finally the 5-minute warning bell rang for the next period.

I made eye contact once again with Miyamoto before she finally stopped her rambling and realized that it was time for us to go.

"W-well, we should get to the next class." She said before making her way down the stairs.

I stood there for a good few seconds and took one last look out at the birds making their way to their nests. I gave one last sigh before starting to make my way down the stairs after Miyamoto.

"I wish I could fly." I muttered audibly.

"What was that Kaizer-san?" She looked back at me wondering what I was mulling over.

"N-Nothing. Let's get to class." I ended our conversation passing her up.

[Classroom 3-C]

Staring out at the window I waited there for the next two periods to pass. I had only math and history left to discuss in class and in terms of knowledge I had a pretty good grasp on what they were talking about so I made a really good grade on their pop quizzes.

As the evening bell rang and all the students started to make their way out of the classroom I continued to look out the window and watched to see if there were any birds flying through the sky. I waited there until I was interrupted in my bird search by my one and only good friend.

"Hey! Dumbass!" He yelled at me throwing an eraser at my head making me turn to face him. "Time to go! Let's go get some ramen!" He yelled again trying to snap me out of my melancholy.

My best friend, Hiyu Horaiji, was standing at the door waiting for me to get up and go with him to the nearby ramen shop. I debated getting up for a couple of seconds. I wasn't sure if I wanted to have ramen but I knew if I would put up a fight about where we were going I would soon find myself in a headlock.

Weighing my options I slowly got up and made my way over.

"Alright that's my #1 man!" He said over-energetically slapping me in the back.

We made our way out of the school and started to make our way down the street to the nearby ramen shop. On the way we heard a commotion come from behind us.

"Go go go! We gotta get going before they catch up to us!" I heard a couple of kids yelling as they sped past us on their Air Treks.

Behind them I could see another group of kids on their Air Treks speeding after them and it looked like they were having a good time playing down the street.

I've never really been much of a sports guy but I have always been on a pair of rollerblades since I received my first pair back when I was 10.

Air Treks are roughly the same concept as roller blades but instead of gaining speed from man-made power, it's all electric. The motors in the Air Treks are a lot more powerful than your average motor and the speed and jumping power of these bad boys made it almost seem unreal with how fast and high you could go.

The only set back of these items were the price of them. I didn't have nearly enough cash to pay for them and I knew my parents would never put forth the money to do so. We just didn't have the cash and the fact was that these things were very high maintenance.

I always thought that if I could ever get my hands on a pair of Air Treks, or more commonly known as "AT's" then I would be able to grow a pair of wings like I used to have when I did parkour. I wished so badly that I could get enough money to afford a pair but I knew it would be at least another 6 months before I would gain anywhere near enough.

Sighing at the sight I looked up again towards the sky and noticed the sun started to wane slightly behind the clouds.

"I wish I could fly…" I muttered to myself as we both walked down to the ramen shop.

"What was that Kiritsu?" Hiyu asked me as he was looking in his wallet to see how much money he had.

"Nothing. Just wondering what those stupid kids are doing." I said trying to dodge any further questions.

"Eh, probably doing something stupid like kids always do. Like we used to right?" He responded with a chuckle.

My friend and I have always lived by the motto: "We'd rather die while we're living than live while we're dead." What this means is that we don't really care if we're standing on the small thread between life and death. As long as we're having fun and living every second as if it were our last, then we can die a happy life.

I've always loved living like that. It's the main reason why I loved parkour so much. That is, until the accident two years ago when I nearly died by falling off of a house.

I broke my legs in six different places on both of my legs and some of the bone fragments in my ribs broke off and pierced my lungs. The doctors saved my life miraculously but I would no longer have the same lung power or the proper leg alignment to be able to run anymore.

I can still do the basic physical activities like anyone else but I can't do parkour anymore. I've never been the same since. I haven't smiled since that event nor have I been able to fully appreciate life without parkour. It was my way to freedom. It was my way of expressing who I was and it was the only way I knew how to get away from my troubles on the ground.

Now I was grounded against my will.

"Kiritsu!" My friend yells at me, making me snap back to reality.

"Jeez man, I really wonder if you even care about what I say anymore." He says giving me a puppy-eyed face.

"Of course I don't pay attention to what you say anymore man, I don't care." I replied to him sarcastically.

"AH! Hidoi!" He started to tear up slightly as if he actually got hurt.

"You know, you're a little TOO good at that. Y'know?" I ask him as we near the ramen vendor.

"Of course, it's the only way I'm going to get through to you nowadays." He responded wrapping his arm across the back of my shoulders as we went into the ramen stall.

"Old man!~" My friend yelled into the kitchen. "Whip us up two bowls please!"

"Who the hell are you calling old man you damn kid?!" I heard the man say from the back of the small vending stall.

In a brilliant display of speed and acrobatics, the large, slightly obese man came out from his kitchen slapped two bowls onto the table in front of us, took my friend by his hair and put him into an arm lock in less than a grand total of 3 seconds.

"O-ow! Let me go!" My friend cried in pain as he started to lose the blood flow to his head.

"Not until you take it back you little trouble maker!" The large man replied as he continued to tighten his grip.

"Okay okay! I give up! I surrender!" Horaiji said as he started to tap out.

"Not the answer… I'm looking for!" He tightened his grip until I could see my friend start to pass out slightly.

"O-Okay… you're not old…" He softly said before nearly passing out.

"Alright then." The man said before dropping my friend on the ground. "How are you doing Kiritsu? Still looking out them windows?" He looked towards me.

"You know if I didn't know any better I'd say you were stalking me Mr. Riju." I replied to him as I took in the aroma of the ramen. "Still smells as good as usual by the way."

"Well thak you Kiritsu, but please stop calling me Mr. Riju… makes me feel old." He said as he went behind the counter again. "Just call me Nasu. It would make me feel 15 years younger." He started to laugh.

"Yea right, if you were 15 years younger you'd still be old man Riju to me." My friend replied as he jumped back from almost getting snatched up again.

"Sorry Mr. Riju, it's been beaten into me since I was 4 years old. Can't help it." I said before starting to chow down on my bowl of ramen.

As I continued to enjoy my little meal I noticed that both Hiyu and Mr. Riju kept eyeing each other and then back at me. I could've sworn I saw a smile appear on both of their faces but I was too hungry to pay attention.

The bickering continued as it usually did. Hiyu would crack a joke at Mr. Riju being either fat or old and Mr. Riju would respond by bashing his head into the counter leaving an imprint and a small trail of blood trickling down his face from where it impacted. I honestly wondered at some point if my friend was brain damaged from all the times his head was slammed into the counter but it didn't seem to affect him that much.

Either way, it was the same old relationship between the two of them. I was glad to have met such great people.

As I finished my meal and clapped my hands together I thanked Mr. Riju for the meal. It was just as I was about to leave though that I felt my collar snag on something.

"Hey, where do you think you're going Kiritsu?" My friend asked me as he grabbed a hold of my collar.

"Going home? I know we live on opposite ends of the neighborhood and I need to take care of some things at home. I'll talk to you later after I finish those things up." I said as I got myself free from his grasp.

"Oh really? Don't you remember what day it is today?" He asked me as if he was in shock.

"It's Thursday. August 7th." I replied.

"Aaaand?"

"Aaaand… It's the school festival today that we decided to not participate in?" I continued.

"AAAaaand?" He started to get louder.

"Aaaand…" I stopped there when it hit me.

It was the 2 year anniversary of when the accident happened.

"Yea… that. Look we both got something for you out back. You might wanna check it out before you leave." He said as he went to the back of the stall.

"He's right you know. Ever since the accident he's felt responsible so we both whipped up something for you. Get your little ass back here and check out what we got you." Mr. Riju added as he too went out the back door.

Contemplating what to do, I waited there and thought about what they might be talking about. They knew I didn't want to remember that day two years ago but now they want me to remember on this day? They want to give me something on this day so I have to recall that incident?

Mulling over my options I decided I wouldn't be rude and I stepped through the kitchen to the back door. Standing in front of the door I had my hand hovering over the handle and waited there. I didn't know why I was acting like this. Was it anxiety? Over something as simple as a gift?

Realizing that what I was doing was stupid, I decided to open the door and see what they had planned.

Outside in the back, I noticed there was a box on the ground. Mr. Riju and Hiyu were both on either sides of the box and they stood there with smiles on their faces. I didn't know what they were planning but whatever it was, it was in that box.

The box wasn't even that big. It couldn't have been any larger than a shoe box and they thought with all their hearts that this was going to make my day.

Walking up to the white box I picked it up and noticed that it was a lot heavier than the average shoe box. Whatever was in this, it wasn't a pair of shoes.

"Open it already you dumbass. You're making me nervous the longer it takes you to open it so just open it." My friend said punching me slightly in the arm.

Opening the box I noticed two wheels as I slowly pulled up the lid. They were attached to a shoe-like mechanism and on the side I could see the mechanism was made of metal and plastic. The metal was coated in a black and red paint in the design of a flame streaking across the side and the plastic was coated in white to keep some of the finer parts of the mechanism intact.

To sum up what I was seeing: it was pair of black and red AT's.

Something snapped in me that day. I'm not sure what it was nor where it came from but something in me changed. It felt good. I didn't feel like a bad change or if it could even be described as a change. It felt more like a removal of chains, a removal of my restraints and a removal of anything that felt like an obstacle to me.

It was my freedom. My freedom had now been restored.


	2. The Roads

_Kneeling in front of a pair of AT's, Kiritsu is wondering exactly what he should say to his best friend._

"I… I don't know what to say Horaiji…" I said as I knelt there.

"Well, you can start by thanking me, and then you can start to get good at using them." He said as he pulled me to my feet.

"I can even teach you the basics if you want… but I think you'd figure it out pretty easily since you're pretty good at regular roller blades." He continued as he looked over at the nearby alley.

"In fact… Here let me show you something I bet you can already do." He quickly spat out as he went into his backpack and brought out his own pair.

Grabbing ahold of the AT's, I opened up the laces and stuck both of my feet into the soles of the contraption. Slowly lacing it back up I felt something… _different,_ about myself. I felt some sort of new power welling up from inside me when I fully tightened the laces into a knot and stood on them without turning on the power.

I looked over at my friend and saw that he was now ready and was turning on his AT's.

Mimicking him I reached down and turned them on. Almost abruptly my AT's started to move me forward and almost instinctively I went forward and started to speed up. The next thing I knew I was moving faster than I could ever possibly go on regular rollerblades and I was about to hit a nearby streetlight pole.

Moving my weight to the right, towards the alleyway, I hoped with all my might that I would move in that direction so as to not completely ruin my day by knocking myself out against a pole.

To my surprise I actually moved just in time to barely avoid a full contact of the pole. I still grazed it, sure but, I was now barreling down a dead-end alleyway that was only roughly 10 feet wide. Thinking fast I jumped how I normally would if I was in roller blades. It was probably the worst thing I could've done.

Now, I was airborne…

…15 feet up in the air…

…Still headed towards the wall.

Using what little airborne maneuverability that I could muster up, I bent my body back and had my feet headed straight towards the brick wall that would almost certainly mean me pancaking against it.

My plan was to use my AT's rebound-like ability to bounce off the wall unscathed and head the other direction and land back where I started and hopefully not die in the process. Oddly enough, but nothing outside of my expectations, it didn't happen that way.

Instead of me launching off of the wall like I wanted, I felt my AT's impact against the wall and immediately afterwards I felt my legs cave in. After my legs caved in I soon felt that my butt was up against the wall and in tow was my back.

And just to recap exactly what happened, I pancaked against the wall with my back and it all happened within half of a second. I didn't necessarily break anything but I knew that from this height that I wouldn't come out unscathed or without broken bones.

After I lost my traction to the wall I started to peel off, making my descent towards the ground.

"This… is going to hurt…" I muttered out before closing my eyes, waiting for the impending crash.

"WAKE UP YOU DUMBASS!" I heard my friend yell at me as if he was right next to me.

I opened my eyes and oddly enough, he was actually right next to me grinding up the wall with his hand extended towards me. Immediately grasping onto it, I used it as a fulcrum and brought my feet around until they latched onto the wall.

As soon as my feet landed on the brick surface I felt them take hold and started to grind up just like my friend. Leaning instinctively forward I proceeded to fly up the wall and it soon turned into a race as to who could reach the top first.

It wasn't surprising to see that my friend beat me first since he had been doing this a lot longer however, I did reach the top.

As soon as my face was hit by the light of the sun I felt my feet leave the surface of the wall and I landed on the roof of the apartment buildings we were grinding on. Across the gap I looked over to see my friend breathing slightly heavy.

"Thanks."

"Not a problem. Can't have you breaking a bone this fast. I'm actually… quite surprised." He said as he jumped across the gap and landed next to me.

"I can't believe you went straight into an upwards run man. That was insane!" He exclaimed as he grabbed ahole of my arms.

"You've got a serious talent for this man! If you keep this up, you might be as good as me in the next 300 years!" He said shaking me.

"Yeah, yeah, let go of me already…" I replied, breaking contact with him.

I looked down and noticed we were noticeably 60 feet in the air.

"So… how do we get down?" I asked as I looked at him.

He didn't look back at me. Instead he just stood there looking at the sky, holding his hand out as if reaching towards it.

"Why would you ever want to touch the ground again?" He asked.

I didn't know how to respond. I wanted to sound like a smart ass and tell him that I would want to stay on the ground so I could do my regular duties as a high school student but I then wondered if that was even true.

Why did I ever want to return to the ground? The ground was my enemy. It was my restraint to the skies above. It was the epitome of my hatred and my sorrow that slowly started to seep into my heart. Why would I ever want to return to that?

Realizing this, I turned my face up towards the sky with my back leaning against my friend's back. We both stood there for a good moment just staring and reaching for the sky. Not a care in the world, just standing on top of the rooftops with our good friend Mr. Riju below.

"Hey! Get down here!" We heard him bellow at us as we snapped back to reality.

"U-Uh… we should get down there…" My friend said scratching his head.

"What about that whole, 'Why would you want to go back down to the ground?' part?" I asked him as we both revved up our AT's.

"Well, I don't want to die. I'd rather be on the ground and live another day than have old man Riju find a way up here and beat me to smithereens." He said with the anime-like sweat drop sliding down his face.

"Good point." I said as we both got near the edge. "So how DO we get down?" I asked him as we stopped.

"What do you mean? It's just as simple as you would get up here… just ride." He said as he jumped off and slid down the wall as if he was riding down a path.

"No way~!" I complained as I mimicked him and started to slide my way down the wall, avoiding the windows and the flower pots that were hanging outside by their metal hangers.

Noticing my friend launch off of the wall near the bottom, I mimicked his move and I went into a tumbling roll since I missed the landing. Sliding across the ground, I hit a bump and went flying into the nearby dumpster and slammed against the metal bin.

"O-Ow…" I groaned as I slid to the side slowly and planted my head against the ground.

"Tough landing eh?" My friend said as he walked up to my mutilated carcass.

I had never felt so much pain across my body in my entire life. My legs were numb, my back was throbbing and I think my head was even bleeding from the impact of the ground. My hearing was shot, my eyesight was blurry at best and I swear I could've seen stars as far as the eyes could see, further blinding my vision.

"H-Huh…?" was all I could reply as my eyes slowly started to close.

Darkness quickly overtook me and I heard a slight mumbling in the background. Before I knew it, my senses were dead and I was stuck in the confines of my psyche.

Questions clouded my thoughts. It was reassuring to know that I hadn't died from the impact and it was even more relieving to know that I could properly think enough to form questions.

How long would I be here in this state? Did I break my chains from the ground? Have I achieved my freedom?

Some of these questions seemed to be pretty simple to answer but as soon as I was able to mentally answer them, another would replicate and jump in my face making me rinse and repeat the same process over and over again.

If I wasn't such a calm and collected person I probably would have gone insane from the insanely redundant and repetitive process that left me here in a state of limbo.

Swiping across my eyesight, as if it were a cleaning wipe washing away all of the darkness, I started to come to my senses and I realized I was staring up at the sky.

After my sight was fully reestablished, my sense of smell returned, and man did it smell terrible where I was.

I looked over to my right and saw a close up of a brick that was imbedded in cement and placed right next to another brick.

'A brick wall…' I thought before turning away from it.

I turned my head all the way to the left and then noticed why it smelled so badly near me… I was lying down in a pile of trash bags.

Realizing the situation that I was in, I decided to do everything within my power to get out of the mess. Needless to say, it didn't go as planned.

As I tried to get up and out of the pile of trash I noticed that I accidentally clawed my way into a bag of trash and all of the contents spilled out onto me.

Everything from fast food garbage to old, moldy food, to rotten diapers and even some pieces of dog crap came flying out of the bag landing directly on me.

"O….Oh god…" was all I muttered before feeling the urge to throw up my lunch.

Recuperating from the waste spill, I slowly got to my knees and then onto my feet. I noticed that I hadn't moved much from where I had landed on my head.

"Why did they just leave me here?!" I complained.

"Leave you where?" I heard my friend say from behind me.

"Why'd you leave me in the trash!" I yelled at him.

"Your head was bleeding… Mr. Riju said if we moved you it might have caused brain damage but it seems like you're fine. Tough skull you have there eh?" He said laughing.

"It's not funny man! What if I died from an infection in my head from being in this trashy heap?"

"Well then it sucks to be you." He replied plainly.

"Asshole."

"Yea, but you love me for it. Right?"

"Starting to doubt it really…" I replied teasing him.

"Ah! I see you're up Kiritsu! That's good!" I heard Mr. Riju from the shop.

"Yeah, no thanks to you but I will be fine… I hope." I said as I started to take off my AT's.

"What are you doing?" Horaiji asked before stopping my hands.

"I'm going to take these off so I can take a cab to the hospital." I said trying to explain my thought process.

"Nah, its rush hour right now man. It'd be a lot faster with AT's. C'mon we'll take it nice and easy." He said as he pulled me up to my feet.

"You're joking right? I can hardly see straight with so much blood loss from my head." I complained as I leaned on his shoulder.

"Yeah, true… but I bet if we moved fast enough, you'd see _'it'_." He said as he emphasized on the word "it".

"What do you mean by 'it'"? I asked as I still held onto him for support.

"Do you remember when we used to do parkour? You were always good at finding those specific areas to run in or niches in the rock to climb up an obstacle. You were amazing at that. Remember what we called that?" He asked me as I remembered everything we did a few years back.

"Yea I remember. We called it the Free-Runner's Eye." I said with a smile.

"Yes, that's it. The Free-Runner's Eye…" he said as he remembered the name. "Well, in the world of AT's we also have something like 'The Free-Runner's Eye'. We call it a 'road'." He started to explain.

"A road?"

"Yeah, a road. Like a road in the sky or a road in the water or even a road on the fires of a bonfire. We call these roads and in our world there are a total of 8 roads. These roads are governed by a king, so in total there are 8 kings each with their own specified road detailed to each." He kept trailing on.

"So… wait… hold up a second." I said stopping his train of thought. "You said that if we moved fast enough, we would be able to see these 'roads' but, what exactly IS a road?" I tried to wrap my head around his concept.

"Well, that's the thing. A 'road' is like you would expect it to be. It's a way of travel but, in the world of AT's a road is a person's life. It's how they use their AT's. It symbolizes everything a storm rider stands for and it is the beginning of every storm rider's journey." He said as he peered up at the sun.

"Wait… Storm Rider…?"

"Yeah, a Storm Rider. It's a person who rides with AT's. As of right now, you're a Storm Rider." He said pointing at me.

"Wait wait wait… You're telling me that I am a thing called a storm rider and that if I move fast enough I should be able to see a 'road' that will becoming the beginning of my journey as a 'Storm Rider'?" I questioned him as I felt my legs start to give out.

"Hrm… yeah, that just about sums it up!" he said as he smacked his fist into his hand.

"You've got to be joking… right?" I replied a little stunned.

"Nope. Not one bit man. I'd even go as far as to be that you're going to go far in the world of AT's." he said as he turned away from me. "Not like this guy…" he muttered staring up at the sky.

"What was that?" I responded trying to figure out what he said.

"It's nothing. Hey we need to get you to the hospital fast so follow me closely alright?" he said as he started to make his way towards the street.

"Alright… right behind you." I said before following him into the street and taking off down the road.

Looking back at the shop I saw Mr. Riju walk out of the shop just before turning the corner out of sight.

"Hey guys! I got my car up and running, I should be able to get Kiri-" He cut off his thought as soon as he realized he was talking by himself.

"…Eh?" He said aloud as he looked down and noticed the two AT streak marks on the ground. "Tch. Idiots." He muttered as he looked up at the sky and smiled. "I guess he won't be staring out them windows much longer…" he said before going back inside.

[City Street]

Going down the roads, I noticed that we had gained an insane amount of speed and momentum. I knew that we were going pretty fast and if I had lost my balance I would've most surely been hurt severely but, for some reason I didn't feel fear.

I didn't feel any fear in any part of my body, only the adrenaline pumping through my veins making me want to go faster.

Unable to contain my need for speed any longer, I took off ahead of my friend and started weaving through the oncoming traffic. Dashing from side to side I jumped over one car and landed the taxi light of another.

Jumping off, I landed on top of an 18-wheeler and stood there looking down at my friend who just caught up.

"Having fun yet?!" He yelled at me as he too jumped up to the truck.

"Yeah, didn't think this would be that fun." I admitted to him as I started to roll down towards the back of the vehicle.

"I guess, if I go even faster than this… I'll see that 'road'?" I asked my friend as I turned around towards him.

"Yeah. You will." He said smiling.

The truck went onto an overpass and I saw that off in the distance was the hospital. If we didn't get off the truck here, we wouldn't be getting any closer to the hospital.

"Well then, what are we waiting for?" I asked him rhetorically before falling backwards off the side of the truck and launching off the side towards the road under the overpass.

"Hey! Wait for me!" He yelled at me as I started my descent, grinding down the wall and jumping into the middle of the traffic on the road.

"I'm going to see it first." I said to myself as I pushed my AT's to their limit and started to weave through the traffic.

Up ahead I noticed that there was a construction going on and there was a dirt ramp that had gathered from them digging. It looked pretty stable enough and I knew that I would have to get up from this road to the next overpass if I wanted to get to the hospital.

Thinking fast, I revved my AT's up and sped towards the ramp of dirt.

Turning my wheels slightly inwards, I brought my AT's to an angle that would send me high into the air and over the overpass. To my surprise, as I launched off the ramp, it worked rather well. The only problem was, it worked a little too well.

Before I knew what was up and what was down, I noticed I was 30 feet up from the overpass and I was flying alongside the telephone wires.

"OH CRAP~!" I yelled as I moved myself onto the telephone wires and began to go even faster down them.

"Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap." I kept saying over and over again as I went speeding down the telephone lines and towards the hospital.

I looked up ahead and noticed I was running out of wire.

I had calculated two options in front of me:

I could either 1, Continue running down the wire and hope for the best as I would get farther and farther away from the hospital.

Or 2, Jump off of the wire at its closest point towards the hospital and hope to land on the roof.

I hadn't really calculated how far the distance was from the closest point of the wires to the church since I never really thought about it but, I knew for a fact that this was going to be one hell of a jump if I was to land safely on the roof.

Deciding to take my chances, I decided to jump off of the telephone wire and see where it would take me.

Nearing my spot to jump off, I noticed below me that my friend had already reached the hospital.

'How in the hell?' I thought before refocusing.

I would only have one chance at this jump. I would either become a blood-filled pancake on the wall of the hospital (Oh the irony.) or, I would be landing safely on the top of the roof with no injuries incurred by my stupidity.

Finally within 10 feet of my destination, I bent low and gathered all of my strength into my legs.

"Well, here goes." I muttered as I leaped off of the wire and hoped to god that I would land.

It was the longest few seconds of my life. I didn't know if I was going to make it or not. I didn't know what would happen if I would fail to make the jump.

Was it going to hurt insanely badly if I implanted myself into the wall? Was it going to be as painful as it was when I landed against that brick wall back at Mr. Riju's? Either way, it didn't matter.

Before I could stop the questions from flooding my brain, my vision changed.

Everywhere around me I noticed that there was a stream of wind condensed into a path below me. It was a fast and volatile path that shifted and twisted with such vigor that it seemed that the path would break below me if I didn't keep up my speed.

Before I could take in the awe-inspiring scenery before me, it vanished and I noticed that I was now halfway over the hospital, about to land.

Bracing for impact, I landed on the roof and spun myself around 360 degrees several times trying to slow myself down.

Finally decreasing in speed, I neared the edge of the hospital roof and stopped just shy of five feet.

Taking a deep breath I went back to the other end of the roof and looked down at my friend.

"Hey! I saw it!" I yelled down at him as I gave a thumbs up.

**Alright, Chapter 2 down. Sorry for the wait. I don't know if this is going to kick off or not but hopefully it will. Please R&R and let me know what you think about it. I will be trying to update this when I can. Hope you enjoyed it, look forward to the next chapter.**


	3. The Parts War

_Finally getting discharged from the hospital with a decently large tube of Vicodin, Kiritsu starts to make his way back to his home on his AT's. What is on his mind? What can he do to get better at AT's._

Getting discharged from the hospital was a great feeling. I finally could get moving again and I would now be able to spend most of my time that was spent sleeping, to practicing riding AT's. Grinding down the railing of the stairs I went straight into the street and ducked underneath a barred off alleyway and made my way down the abandoned corridor.

Zipping down the alleyway, I decided I would practice jumping from wall to wall and see how the traction on my AT's affected my running.

I noticed early on that each time I jumped from one wall to the other my traction would immediately slip, thus making me lose quite a bit of momentum and speed.

'Gotta practice that.' I thought before jumped up even higher onto a narrow ledge that I started to grind down.

Looking forward I noticed that there was another rider grinding down the same narrow ledge that I was on. She had long hair that was waving in the wind. She wore a skimpy skirt that barely hid any amount of skin that was worth to hide and she had a nice cop-looking cap that sat perfectly on her head.

Her AT's were green and seemed to act as boots that covered over half of her legs and ended at the top of her knee.

She looked like she was a very skilled rider and she did many tricks that sent her all over the place of the alleyway. She moved like a green leaf on the wind and I swore she looked back at me at one point when she was jumping from one side of the alley to the other.

Taking in her image I noticed finally that I was about to run out of ledge to grind on. In reaction, I quickly jumped up a wall and started riding it up until finally reached the top of the building.

Looking down the way I noticed she flew out of the alleyways and started to go into a spin. It was magnificent to take in and I could've stayed there at the edge of the alleyway just watching her ride.

It was then I heard a voice break me out of my dream.

"IKKI!" I heard a girl say from down below.

Looking down I noticed there was a girl talking to a boy who happened to also be watching her ride.

'Heh, looks like I'm not the only one.' I thought before jumping off the building and flying off towards my house.

Strangely enough, as I was nearing my house I noticed that the girl I had seen earlier down the alleyway was waiting for someone three doors down from where my house was. I didn't know if she was waiting for me, or if she was waiting for someone else but I couldn't just let this chance to get to know her just slip on by.

Dropping down from my perched location, I landed roughly 15 feet away from her and I started to approach her.

"Yo." I greeted her with a wave.

"Hello." She replied turning towards me.

"What are you doing waiting out here at this time of day?" I asked her, trying to spark up a conversation.

"Oh not much, just trying to start some havoc like I always do." She said with a smile.

"Havoc huh? I doubt a person such as you could start that much trouble." I replied laughing.

"Well, maybe you're right." She said as she turned around and looked up at the sky. "Maybe I'm not the type of person to do such a thing."

"Oh well, just be sure to not stay out too long. This part of town isn't that safe. Been known to have a couple of gangs that all ride with AT's." I warned her.

It wasn't that I was too terribly concerned with her safety since she was such a good rider and I bet that she could've gotten away from any danger but, I was concerned with possibly having to get involved if she wasn't able to get away.

It wasn't like me to not help out someone who was in danger if I was in the area but, in my current condition it would be hard for me to do anything worthwhile to help someone with my injuries.

"Well, thanks for the warning." She turned around to face me._ "Shy Boy." _She said in english.

"N-No problem." I replied blushing a little. "Well, I need to go take care of some things, be careful." I said quickly before jumping away from her and landing on top of a house.

Turning myself around and looking off in a random location, I took the time to take one last look at her and then jumped off out of sight. I would be in the area for awhile to look after her just in case she didn't heed my warning and got into trouble with some people.

Sitting there for the next 30 minutes I waited for anyone to show up and I started to get bored with it. I almost wanted to leave but I had the feeling that if I left at that moment then my bad luck would pop up and she would then be in danger when I wasn't around.

Sighing at my predicament I sat there like a good boy and waited for my opportunity to show off if the need arose.

Another 15 minutes passed and still nothing. She was still standing there waiting and I was still sitting in my corner waiting for something to happen. It was starting to get dark and before I knew it, the sun had already waned behind the clouds and darkness soon descended on the area.

'Tch. Just my luck.' I thought before getting up and moving to the far end of the wall to see if the girl was still there.

To my surprise she wasn't there anymore. In fact, there was no trace of her ever being there.

Realizing I had failed in my task I quickly jumped out and tried to look for her. I looked up, down, left, right, hell I even looked into the yards of people's houses to see if she was hiding there out of sight.

It was then that the unthinkable happened.

"Oh? I didn't expect you to still be here… _Shy Boy._" I heard her say as if she was right behind me.

Slowly turning around I noticed that she actually was standing right behind me and was almost leaning up against me.

"AH!" I reacted by jumping back and up onto a house.

"D-Don't do that!" I said trying to calm myself down.

"Oh? Was it something I did?" She looked at me tilting her head slightly.

"N-No, forget about it." I looked off to the side to hide my blushing face.

"W-why are you still here?" I asked her trying to avoid her from noticing my face.

"Well, like I said before, I'm here to cause havoc." She said smiling.

Turning around I noticed she had silently gotten up on top of the house and was leaning forward towards my face.

Almost immediately my face turned completely red and I once again let out a small cry for help and leaped back, at least I would've done it if she didn't grab my face with both of her hands.

"A-Ah… W-What are you doing…?" I asked her trying not to completely freak out.

"Hrm…" she responded looking deep into my eyes.

Her eyes were an intricate design of gray and green overlapping each other as if they were a weave of thread. She wore goggles on her face and her police hat strangely went well with the other accessories.

Realizing that she was getting closer and closer to my face I felt my skin getting hotter and hotter until finally she was no more than a few hair strands away from me.

Just as I was about to ask her to get away from my face, I heard a noise from the alley near us that made my face turn towards it. It sounded like a bunch of AT's that all started up at once but I could've been wrong.

My suspicions were confirmed when 5 Storm riders came flying out of the alley in every direction, completely surrounding us. I couldn't see their faces since they were all wearing dog masks and each of them had the same blazer covering their upper body.

Just from this, I realized that they were all in the same 'Team'. Horaiji was telling me earlier about these teams and about the Parts Wars.

There were a total of 6 different classes and each of them tried to reach the top to become a King in their separate road. It didn't make much sense to me since I didn't even know what a King was but regardless it definitely meant a lot to Storm Riders.

Snapping myself back to reality I noticed that the one of the masked figures stood out. He had a larger helmet than all the others and it was the shape of what could be considered an alpha dog. He stepped up closer to us both and was looking directly at the girl.

"SIMCA! Give us back what you stole or prepare to face my Dakong!" He said pointing to himself as if he was on a higher plane than us.

"Oh poor little puppy. Did you think I had your emblem?" She asked him with an innocent face.

"Yes I did, and I know you have it now!" He said taking another step towards her.

"But I don't. I gave it to this nice man right here!" She said smiling while grabbing me.

"W-wait… what?" I asked her as I looked back at the man who was now directing his anger at me.

"Are you telling me that you've given it to this person right here?!" He said revving his AT's up as if he was ready to smash my skull in with them.

"Yes, that is correct. If you defeat him you will get your emblem!" She said jumping away.

"You've got to be kidding me!" I yelled at her as she flew off.

"Hold them off for me _Shy Boy!_" She said back at me as she went off in the distance.

Looking back I noticed that the other surrounding me had started to close the gap between me and them and I wasn't going to be getting away that easily at this rate.

"Well now, I guess that makes things a lot easier." I heard the man in front of me say before I saw him rear his head back.

"FACE MY DAKONG!" he yelled out before bringing it straight down on me.

Instinctively moving back I slammed into one of the members and used him as a wall to vault over and kick off of. Jumping off of the man I sent him flying into the "Dakong" and he was slammed into the rooftop tile, completely cracking and destroying the roof where he impacted.

'That's gonna hurt if I get hit by that…' I thought before jumping back even farther to avoid a kick to the face by two other members.

"Hey hey, c'mon guys 5v1 isn't exactly fair don't you think?" I asked trying to put some reason into these people.

"Our emblem is on the line, do you honestly think we're going to just let you get away with stealing it?!" He yelled at me as he dashed forwards and kicked me in the gut faster than I could react.

Coughing up some blood I went spiraling backwards off of the roof and into a wall. I didn't stay there long since it wasn't too much of an impact and I soon fell off into the alleyway.

Sliding down the walls I jumped off into the network of the neighborhood and soon I found myself alone grinding down the ledges and getting myself as far away from that location as fast as possible. I knew they were somewhere in the area but as long as I didn't see them and I kept moving, I would be able to get away.

It didn't happen that way though.

As soon as I turned a corner and jumped up to another ledge I was greeted with a knee coming straight to my face. Ducking underneath it, I slid under him and grabbed is other leg to trip him and make him fall down to the floor below.

"Gotta do better than that!" I taunted him before turning to meet a close-line that sent me into an uncontrollable flip in the air that eventually made me land on the ground.

"O-Ow…" I muttered before getting up only to feel another pair of wheels impact my back and send me right back down into the ground.

Coughing up even more blood I felt my consciousness fading since I was still recovering from my head wound from before.

'C-Can't pass out now…' I said to myself as I focused on remaining conscious.

"That's enough." I heard the leader say before I felt the wheels on my back lift off of me.

"Now, give us our emblem back." He said reaching his hand down towards my face as if he was expecting me to place it in his hand.

"And what makes you think…" I continued before coughing up a little more blood. "…That I even have such a thing?" I asked him before trying to get up again.

This time, it wasn't the others who stopped me from getting up but my body itself couldn't get up. I had lost all the strength in my body to get up off of the ground and it would be awhile before I would be able to move.

Realizing that it was impossible to get up I slid back down and waited to be beaten to submission.

It never happened though since before I could see what was going on, I heard screaming from behind me. Almost immediately following that I heard the leader jump out from in front of me and confront whatever was making the screams take place.

"Hey! What do you think you're doing?!" He yelled at the assailant.

"I could say the same to you, Inuyama." I heard a familiar voice say back.

"I'm here to get my emblem back. I was told that this person here was given it. I'm here to retrieve it."

"Well, I can tell you right now that this person here has no intention or affiliation with the parts war. He's just recently a new youngling who has just gotten used to riding. He hasn't been riding for anymore than two days." I heard him say as I notice a pair of AT's appear next to me.

I recognized those AT's. They belonged to Horaiji. I didn't know Horaiji decided to come here to see where I was; I thought he was already back at his place sleeping since he had a big day tomorrow.

Guess I was wrong.

"H-Hor-Horai…"I couldn't get his name out.

"Hey bro. I see they did a number on you huh?" he said as he knelt down next to me. "Don't worry I'll get you out of this mess."

"Now, what are you going to do Inuyama?" I heard Horaiji say as he got back up.

"Well, if what you say is true and if you're dead set on protecting this newbie, then I can't see any reason to continue this." He replied.

"I will take my leave of this place and chase after Simca. I will also apologize to you for causing you trouble." He finished as I heard him gather up his remaining members.

Hearing the revving of AT's get farther and farther away from me; I finally started to feel the adrenaline in my body start to wane. With my adrenaline almost completely gone, my consciousness came in tow and before I knew it I was once again in a hospital bed with a nurse looking over me.

[Hospital Room]

"Now what is it you did this time?" She asked me as I noticed it was the same nurse who helped me before.

"Oh, you know me… Just picking up trouble when I don't need it." I replied laughing a little. It was no sooner that I felt a searing pain hit me in my gut. "O-Ow…" I muttered.

"Be sure not to laugh too hard, your internal organs suffered a good beating from whatever it was that dealt it." The nurse cautioned me.

"Thanks, I appreciate it." I said dismissing her.

Immediately following the nurse's departure I saw Horaiji come in.

"Hey Hiyu. How's it going?" I asked him as he came in.

He didn't respond to me. Instead it felt as if there was an aura of gloom about him. He took a seat beside me with his hair slightly shadowing his eyes so I couldn't see it that well.

"I… I'm sorry." I heard him say as he was still looking down.

"Eh? What do you mean man? It wasn't like you knew I was going to be attack-" I was cut off by him.

"THAT'S NOT IT BAKA!" He yelled at me. "I should've been there. I should've been aware of the fact that you were new to the AT world and I should have warned you of the dangers… I should have warned you of what the etiquette was around the AT world and how things operated. Because of me… Because of me you got hurt…" He started to break down.

Covering his face with his arms he places his face on the bed and started to cry. I didn't really know what to say to him to make him cheer up but I couldn't just leave him like this. It then occurred to me of what I had to do to make him feel better.

Clutching him by the hair I lifted his head up and gave him a wallop of a punch straight to the face.

It was enough to send him out of his seat and rolled him backwards until he hit his back against the wall.

"W-What was that-!" this time, it was me who cut him off.

"DO YOU REALLY THINK OF ME THAT WEAK?!" I screamed at him.

"W-What?" He responded a little stunned.

"Do you really think…" I started by forcing myself out of the bed and standing up. "…That I need your protection?! Huh?!" I yelled at him as I took a step closer.

"If you think I need your help to survive in this 'World' of yours, you've got another thing coming. I refuse to be swatted around like a fly and be expected to just take it. When I get out of this hospital and I'm able to ride at 100% again, I'm going to find that Inuyama and I'm going to kick his ass!" I yelled at my friend as I was now only a few steps away from him.

"B-But, I'm at fault here!" My friend protested.

"Wrong answer!" I responded by stomping my foot into his face.

"Hey! I'm trying to say I'm sorry I got you hurt! He said, pulling my foot away and pushing me back into the bed.

"And I'm telling you that it's not your responsibility!" I retaliated by swinging my right fist at him.

Missing him, I brought my leg around and swiped at his head to which he ducked under it and hoisted me by my shirt up against the wall.

"Don't make me beat you into submission damnit! I'm saying I'm in the wrong now just accept it like a good sick kid and get to bed!" He yelled at me as he held me there.

Staring at him I looked at his eyes. They were still streaming down with tears and I knew he still hadn't learned his lesson.

"Wrong…" I muttered at him.

"What was that?" He said trying to figure out what I responded with.

"I said… WRONG ANSWER!" I yelled at him kicking him with both of my feet to his chest.

Sending him flying across the room, I recovered from falling on my ass and quickly used the IV as a support to pull myself up.

"That's it, you're dead!" He reacted by sprinting towards me in an attempt to tackle me.

"Too slow!" I pulled the IV up and tripped him with it.

Swinging the IV over, I brought it down on his back making him fall flat on the ground. Wasting no time, I let go of the IV and brought him into a headlock.

"I don't need your protection… And I don't need you worrying about me!" I said as I struggled against his strength.

I knew I was stronger than him when I was fully healed but since I was in the hospital I wasn't able to muster all of my strength.

It was then that he stopped struggling against me. I knew I didn't tap him out nor did I make him pass out but I think he finally realized what I was getting at.

"Hey… Kiritsu…" He started to ask me.

"Yeah Hiyu?"

"You need a shower." He stated plainly.

"Yea. I know." I responded just as plainly.

"Alright then, I get it, I get it." He said tapping my arms so I would let go.

With that, both of us recovered and we both stared at each other for a few good seconds. Breaking the silence we both brought our hand up at the same time and clasped them together before bringing it to a hug.

"Whatever happens, let's ride together alright? I'll have your back, and you have mine." He said before we broke off the close confrontation.

"Alright then, we'll both be there for each other. No 'Protecting' or 'Being Protected', we both stand as equals in this." I said looking at him in the eye.

"Deal." He responded before a big grin appeared on his face. "Now get a shower, seriously you reek like a dead animal." He said mocking me.

"Well it's not my fault that the nurse doesn't let me get out of bed to do anything…" I groaned before noticing a killing intent appear from the door.

"Oh no." I gasped before I noticed the source from the killing intent appear in the doorway.

It was the nurse, and she was so pissed at the two of us that I think we both started to whimper in fear of the demon's smile that appeared on her face when she asked us what we were doing.

In no time flat, she had beaten both Hiyu and I into submission. Before I knew what was going on, I was already back in bed with a severe concussion and Hiyu was left knocked out in the lobby for the next 5 hours.

I didn't know when exactly I woke up, but at some point down the line I finally bursted myself out of my coma and awoke to the sun once more with a raging headache and a serious hunger in my stomache.

'How long was I out?' I thought before I realized the nurse was standing in the corner looking at me intently.

"AH! Don't hit me!" I flinched before I realized that she was just standing there in a sleep-like state.

It turns out that this nurse was so hard core that she stood there the entire time watching over me so I wouldn't do anything stupid and she actually fell asleep standing up… with her eyes open.

It was a little creepy, sure, but I had no problems with it. I was a little embarrassed actually that she had to put forth so much effort to make sure I wouldn't do anything stupid.

Feeling a little bad, I decided to stay in the bed and order up some grub for myself before I would actually get up.

I was in the hospital for a little under 15 hours before they discharged me, and now my friend, from the hospital.

It was now night time and we still had the weekend ahead of us. I don't know what came over us that night but for some reason we felt the need to go back to the school for some reason. I'm kinda glad we did since I probably would've never met the King of the Flame's Road that night.

**And with that, Chapter 3. Please R&R and let me know what you think about it. I'll be adding in more battles and it will be picking up the pace a lot more once my OC enters in the Parts Wars so please be patient with me as I set this up. Let me know what you think I can do better and what you didn't like so I can improve and thanks for the support.**


	4. Spitfire, King of the Flame Road

_After finally getting discharged from the hospital, Kiritsu and Horaiji head over to the school and witness history in the making._

Rolling our way down the roads and finally reaching the school I had just noticed that it had started to turn dark. What time was it and why exactly did we decide to head to the school at this time of night?

Looking down at my watch the time was just a little after 7PM.

"Hey, Hiyu…" I started looking at my friend.

"Yeah bro, what's up?" He replied looking back at me with his hands outstretched above him.

"Why did we decide to come back to the school and of all times, why this late?" I asked him as if I was lost in his train of thought.

"Well, remember when I talked to you about the Parts War and everything dealing with it?" He looked back at me as if I grew a second head.

"Yea, what about it?"

"Well, why haven't you seen any of the battles taking place then if it's such a big event?" He asked me rhetorically.

"Now that you mention it…" I muttered while thinking back. "…You're right. I haven't."

"Well the reason that you haven't seen any of it…" He started as he jumped up as high as he could to the top of the lower school buildings. "…Is because it happens at night!" He yelled down as he soon jumped higher into the school complex.

"W-What?!" I responded, jumping up and following my friend's movements into the school complex.

As soon as I reached the highest point in the school that I could get to, I noticed that there was over 100 Storm Riders situated throughout the school roofs and they were all looking down at the center of the school.

Looking across the way I noticed my friend was talking to a guy who had the weirdest hair I had ever seen. It looked like his hair was lit on fire and he had a black fur coat with white pants and pure red AT's.

Hesitating slightly, I decided to make my way to him since I knew I wouldn't be able to jump the distance from one end to the other.

Making my way over I noticed that there were two people fighting down at the middle of the school. There was an absurdly obese fat man sitting on top of a railing atop a roof and the other was…

"Wait a second… is that?" I stopped my own words as I focused my vision further down to notice the familiar face.

'It's Ikki.' I thought before noticing that he messed up his grind up the wall and was starting to fall to the ground.

He wasn't going to get out of that fall without any broken bones, in fact I wouldn't be surprised if he would come out of this conflict as a cripple with the height he was falling from.

I wasn't nearly skilled enough to get down there fast enough to save him and no one seemed to care that he was falling from such a dangerous height. It didn't sit right with me. I was honestly wondering if what I was getting into, was what I wanted to be a part of.

Snapping myself back from my train of thought I noticed that he had changed his momentum of falling to a forced fall towards a pole.

'What does he plan to do with that?' I thought before seeing him grab the pole.

"No way. Is he going to grind that pole?" I said aloud as I saw him spin his body around and bring his AT's against the pole.

Shooting up the pole almost as fast as he was falling down, I witnessed him launch off the pole with such a crazy amount of force that he literally landed on top of the fat black man and launch off of him too to bring him ahead.

Whistling in amazement I decided to get myself to a better vantage point to get a good view of the other area which just happened to be where my friend was.

"That was pretty amazing Hiyu." I commented as I landed next to him.

"Yeah, I didn't expect that from a newcomer…" He said bring his hand to his chin and struck a thinking pose.

"Upper soul…" I heard the man with the red hair mutter.

"That's what the move is called?" I asked him as I overheard him.

"Yes. It's an S-Class move that a select few people can pull off and this person just did it in front of everyone." He commented as he still kept his gaze on Ikki.

"Is that considered a bad thing?" I replied as I looked to see Ikki smash through the school building.

"Well, it's not necessarily bad but, you just don't see moves like that in an E-Class Match. With that move alone, Itsuki Minami has put a target on him." He said as he looked over at me for the first time.

"I'm sorry I've just been rambling without me introducing myself. My name is Spitfire, The Flame King." He said as he took a small bow.

I didn't really know how to react… I heard a lot about Kings and how powerful they were and just being in the presence of one seemed a bit overwhelming. I stood there for a good hot minute before finally mustering up any strength to respond.

"L-Likewise… My name is Kiritsu Kaizer… I guess you could call me a newcomer." I said taking a little bow.

"Oh don't be so modest bro, you've gotten pretty good on AT's despite how little time you've had to ride. This guy has been riding for several years and you've only been riding for less than a month." My friend said slapping me on the shoulder as if it was praise.

"Oh so this is the one you were talking about." Spitfire said as he looked at me with a keener eye than before.

"Oh yea, sorry but I was talking behind your back bro. Just thought I'd let my other friends know that you were getting into the Parts War." My friend replied as he took a step back to avoid my right fist that was aimed at his head.

"You told him what?!" I yelled.

"What? I just said that you were very interested in joining!" My friend said jumping back and sliding down the side of the platform to land on another further down.

"I haven't said I wanted to join shit damnit!" I yelled at him as I looked back to see Spitfire eyeing me more closely.

"So…" He began. "…You're not interested?"

"Well… I wouldn't say I'm not interested but… I don't have the proper skill nor the funds to start a team or get the proper parts for my AT's…" I said as I diverted my eyes away from his gaze to notice another girl that was standing beside him.

'Was she always there?' I thought before redirecting my gaze back to Spitfire.

"So, if you get the proper funds and find a team, you'd be willing to be a part of the Parts War then?" He continued to ask me inquisitively.

"W-Well… I guess so but, I don't have a way to get that money right now to do that-" I was cut off by him during my rambling.

"But what if someone was willing to help you get that proper funding and get you situated right away? All you would need to do is get a team together." He said as he continued to gaze into my eyes as if trying to read my thoughts.

"B-But… who'd be willing to do that for me? And why are you so dead-set on me joining in the Parts War?"

"Well, to answer your first question: I would be willing to lend a helping hand and for your second question: I want to see how far you can go to get to the top of the tower." He said with a smirk.

Mulling over my options I thought for awhile on exactly what I should do. I knew I wanted to be a part of the Parts War but something just didn't add up with what Spitfire was saying. He wanted to see how far I would get in the Parts War but, where did this all come from? I hadn't even heard of him or even met him until just a few moments ago and now he's this interested in me?

Continuing to mull it over I was interrupted in my train of thought when the girl behind him said something.

"You shouldn't push him into doing things he doesn't want to do Spitfire." I heard her say as she stepped to the side of him to reveal herself in my vision.

"If he's too scared to join in something he doesn't know about or he isn't willing to take up on your generous offer then you should just let sleeping dogs lie." She said as if she were spitting venom.

I didn't really like to hear those words come out of her mouth. It seemed like she was goading me into accepting the offer and if I didn't accept the offer then it would just prove her point that I was scared.

Clenching my fist and boiling up with anger I shouted out back at her.

"I'm not afraid of anything!" I retorted.

"Oh? Is that so?" She asked as if I had caught her interest.

"Yes. And I'm not going to accept his offer because you're goading me into accepting it." I said with a fire in my eye.

I looked back over and dead-locked my eyes with Spitfire's.

"I'm accepting your offer because I want to see for myself how far I can get in this world. I don't want to be restrained on the ground anymore like a helpless being. I want to be able to fly again." I said as I heard someone land behind me and place a hand on my shoulder.

"See? I told you he had a certain fire." Hiyu said as he smiled at Spitfire.

"Indeed you did. I didn't expect that answer from him and I must say it's refreshing to hear it from one so new to the world." He said as a smile appeared on his face.

"Well then, Kiritsu Kaizer, I welcome you to the world of AT's as a true Storm Rider. I hope to see your progress soon as you enter into the Parts War." He said as he rolled himself backwards on his AT's and gracefully fell off the building.

As soon as I lost sight of him I quickly moved up towards the edge and noticed that the side of the building had scorch marks streaking all the way down to the ground. I noticed farther into the school I could see his AT's leaving a trail of fire where they impacted the ground.

"Haha! He's really into the theatrics that one…" My friend commented laughing to his heart's content.

"Y-Yea… he is isn't he?" I replied as I looked at him.

"So… do you honestly think that I could get far in the Parts War?" I asked with a little doubt in my voice.

My friend didn't immediately respond to me like I thought he would. Instead he just turned away from me and looked up at the dark starry sky and took in a deep breath. Holding it for a few seconds he let out his thought as loud as he could.

"THIS HERE IS MY FRIEND! KIRITSU KAISER! AND HE IS GOING TO BECOME THE NEXT SKY KING!" He roared out catching the attention of every storm rider in the area.

Bringing him immediately into a headlock and starting to choke the shit out of him, I brought my mouth to his ear and whispered in his ear.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" I hissed at him.

"What? You asked what I thought about you joining the Parts War… That's my answer…" He muttered out before his face started turning blue from lack of blood flow.

Looking down at him I notice that he was tapping my arm signaling me to let go since he was about to pass out. Letting him go I looked at him with a curious eye.

"Really?" I asked plainly.

"What? Do you doubt me… that much?" He replied gasping for air.

"But... I'm not even that good. I couldn't even jump across this school from one side to the other like you did." I responded with a slight sadness.

"Hehe, don't worry. I've been riding AT's for 3 years now. Spitfire has been riding for 2 and half." He said with a smile.

"W-Wait, he's been riding for 2 and half years and you've been riding for 3?" I repeated what he commented.

"Yeah? What's the problem?" He asked with a look of confusion.

"T-Then… how strong are you in the world of AT's?"

My friend stopped as if in time for a second. It was as if he was trying to think of how to combat this question and he wasn't properly equipped to answer.

Standing there amidst the noise of AT's whirring and Storm Riders taking to the sky at the end of the Parts War battle, I heard him mutter something. I couldn't make out what it was but I was able to make out one word.

'_**Important.'**_

I wasn't sure what else he said but I was certain he said the word "Important". I wasn't able to ask him though what he said since as the others were leaving he too took to the skies and started to make his way back to his house.

Standing there atop the school roofs I watched as they all filled the sky and I waited there as if restrained from joining them.

Looking down at my hand I wondered exactly what I was getting myself into… I knew I had to do three things to be a part of the Parts War.

I had to One: Gather up a total of 5 members to make a team.

Two: Register my team into the Parts War Database.

Three: Get an emblem to show our territory as well as our trademark for all to know.

I wasn't worried about getting an emblem or getting registered since Hiyu showed me the process and it was rather easy to understand… what I was worried the most about was trying to get 5 team members.

I wasn't the most popular person in my school and I knew that it would be hard to motivate people to join something that I was hosting but I knew that this is what I wanted to do.

Somehow, someway I was going to get 4 others to join my team and we were going to go far in the world of AT's.

'It's either that, or die trying.' I thought before I felt the rev of my AT's start to whirl with an incredible amount of force.

I didn't know if the AT's were speaking to me that night but for some reason I felt like they had become a part of me and they were telling me that this was the only way for me to live.

With a new resolve burning inside my heart, I pushed the AT's to the limit and launched off of the roof with such overwhelming force that I had felt like I was flying through the air way above the standards of being safe.

Looking down below at all the street lights and the roads being lit up by the lamp lights, I quickly landed on the nearest building and started to make my way back home. I knew that if I was late getting home I would die from my parents but I didn't really have that on my mind.

I wasn't moving this fast because I was afraid of being late of my curfew. I was moving this fast because all I wanted to do at that moment was to fly as fast and as far as I could across the night sky lit up by the full moon and the stars etched across the heavens.

It was then that a name hit me like a truck full speed on the highway. I was so awestruck by the idea that I nearly screwed up my landing as I impacted the roof of a nearby sauna.

Recovering from the crappy landing I slid across the shilling roof and jumped off onto an overlooking neighbor's porch. I took a deep breath and looked up at the dark expanse of sky that was in front of me and smiled.

"The Shinsengumi." I said aloud.

This was going to be the name of the team that I would create. We were going to become the Wolves of Mibu. I was always fascinated with the idea of the Shinsengumi. They were feared and they were powerful as well as a renowned organization of the fiercest warriors… or at least that's how I imagined them.

Nodding my head at my great idea, I quickly got away from the neighbor's porch since I heard movement from within and I really didn't feel like dealing with an annoyed neighbor that was near my house.

Quickly jumping down from my vantage point I dashed down the streets and slid across the pavement until I stopped in front of my house.

Taking off my AT's and immediately sprinting through the front door up the stairs into my room, I quickly went to bed and my mind started to race with all the new possibilities that lay before me.


	5. Gathering the Shinsengumi: Kisaragi

_Lying down in his bed, Kiritsu stares up at the sky through his own cut out square hole in his roof. What is on his mind? "Where do I start in recruiting members?"_

[Kiritsu's Room]

I couldn't sleep that well with all the thoughts on my mind. More correctly, I didn't want to sleep. I didn't want to stop thinking about it and rest my body, I was too energetic and I wanted to go farther than anyone had ever gone with AT's.

The battle with Itsuki Minami and his opponent, who I later confirmed was Buccha of the Yaou, made me wonder how far I would get in the Parts War. It made me wonder how far one person could get by themselves and then it made me wonder how far one could get with the right partners. My mind then started wander on who would be good to recruit.

'I wonder if I could get Buccha to join my team...' I thought before realizing Minami had recruited him already.

"Tch." I groaned at the thought.

I wanted to get Buccha to be a part of my team. I knew he had potential and he was a really strong rider that would make a great addition to any team but now that Minami had him, I couldn't do anything to get him.

'Oh well. Guess I gotta get someone even better.' I thought before tossing and turning more in my bed.

It was a lot easier said than done. To begin with, I wasn't very popular among any of my classmates and I definitely wasn't the most social person either. I didn't know where I would even begin to start finding team members but without 5 members I couldn't create a team.

"AH! So frustrating!" I groaned louder as I smacked my fists into my bed.

Where would I go to get members? I didn't know anyone nor would anyone want to get to know me because of my personality. Thoughts started to flood my mind and as soon as they were brought up, they were immediately shot down as if it were paper airplanes vs. a Gatling gun with unlimited ammo.

Somewhere along my thoughts though, I came upon an idea that actually made me stop and think on it for a good moment.

'What if I was to find someone who could recruit for me?' I thought as I laid there with my eyes focused on the stars above.

'What if I found someone who would be able to talk to other a lot better than me? Someone who could make them see things my way.' I thought as a grin started to appear on my face.

"It's perfect!" I exclaimed.

Almost as soon as I shouted that out, another thought appeared in my head.

'But who?'

"FUCK! Shot down again!" I yelled as slammed my head against the wall in frustration.

Hitting my head several times against the wall, I started to feel my brain cells start to commit suicide as they were being pounded into submission.

One after the other, I heard their screams of anguish as they took their own life. I wasn't sure if I was either going insane or if it was just me trying to pass time by coming up with these delusions but eventually I stopped smacking my head and the whole area around me turned completely silent.

It was only then, that the solution to my problem had come forth. Muttering the two words, I drifted off to sleep for however much time I had left until school the next day.

"Aoi… Miyamoto."

[Next Day, Road to School]

Usually when I would go to school, I would have to take the nearby bus since it wasn't within walking distance but now that I had AT's I didn't need to take the bus and I would instead just ride my way down the roads to save both time and money.

It was a good opportunity too since Aoi Miyamoto would always walk to school since she lived so close to it.

Dashing down the streets and making a sharp right turn, I narrowly avoided a car by jumping over it and making a spectacle to the nearby spectators. It wasn't that I wanted to be the center of attention but for some reason as I rode more my senses were becoming more acute, more precise and even sharper than they were before I started to ride.

It was a good feeling. It told me that I was making good progress and if I continued to ride more, I would only get better. What sucked the most was that AT's weren't allowed at school so I wouldn't be able to devote any free time to get better at understanding my AT's.

Getting lost in thought, I took another left turn and almost immediately following that, I bumped into someone making us both fall over. I made sure to move my body just right so I minimized the damage done to the person I hit but because of that, I was sent flying into the nearby wall.

Impacting the wall with my back, I slowly slid down the surface like an anime character and landed straight on my head since I impacted the wall upside down.

Slightly dazed and with blood trickling down my face, I got up and noticed that the person I had knocked over was none other than Aoi Miyamoto. I was glad that I bumped into her immediately but I was also concerned with how she managed after getting hit by me at such a speed. Sure I wasn't moving that fast but if I didn't maneuver my body just in the nick of time then I could've really hurt her.

'Lucky!' I thought before my vision was clouded with stars.

Realizing that the toll on my body was a little worse than I thought, I quickly was pinned down on one knee and I was stuck there trying to recover my senses.

"A-Are you… okay?" I muttered slightly as I placed my hand on my face to stop myself from losing balance.

"Y-Yes… I'm fine." Miyamoto responded as she got up.

She quickly dusted herself off of any dirt that got on her and as her eyes were focused on me she immediately gave a small shriek.

"Oh my god you're bleeding!" She exclaimed as she brought out a handkerchief.

In one quick sweeping motion, she was right next to me tending to the wound on my head. I didn't know how she was able to move that elegantly but in no time at all I could feel the cloth against my head and the searing pain that soon followed.

"O-Ow." I reacted by flinching slightly.

"Sorry but if I don't do this then you're going to lose even more blood and it could get infected." She said as she helped me to my feet. "Come on we have to get you to the nurse's office."

Following her lead, I decided to play the helpless, injured person as we walked through the school. All around us I saw the faces of shocked people as they looked at my injured head. We made our way through the halls towards the nurse's office.

Reaching our destination, Miyamoto opened the door and gently sat me down on the bed before getting the nurse to look at my wound. In no time at all, the nurse gave me some pain medication, disinfected the wound and wrapped it up so it wouldn't degrade any worse.

Just as Miyamoto was about to leave I asked her to stay for a second so I could talk to her.

"Y-Yes? What is it Kaizer-san?" She asked me a little confused at the request.

Mulling over exactly what I should say, I thought for a good long moment on exactly how I should word this. I couldn't let her know that I wanted to gather members up for a battle royal and that I would need her help to gather people up for it. She would never agree to that.

Thinking carefully, I slowly weaved together my tale and soon it came out as words from a book.

"W-Well… the thing is… I'm pretty sure you already know that I'm not the most sociable person in the school." I began.

"Well yes that may be true but…" She tried following along with me.

"I know I'm not that sociable. I know you want to say that I have some good redeemable qualities and all that but no one really knows that except you since you're the class prez and you feel the need to help others out." I kept going trying to weave my plan together.

"Knowing this, I need your help."

"M-My help?" She repeated back to me.

"Yes. I need your help finding people who share the same interests as me. As you can see, I love AT's and you know some things about me that make you keep conversations with me from time to time…" I continued as I slowly saw the end coming in sight.

It was going perfectly. The plan that I had formulated was going along as planned and all it took now was the finisher.

"Is there anyone you can think of that might be… I guess for lack of better words, compatible with my type of personality?"

She stood there for a good long moment trying to take in everything I just threw at her. Sure it seemed a little bit over the top to ask the prez to try and help me find friends and help me with my ulterior motive but it was definitely worth a shot.

"W-Well… I'm not too sure if he's 'Compatible' with your personality or not but… there's one person who reminds me of you in a lot of similar ways." She finally said as she reached back in the confines of her mind.

"Who is he?" I asked in anticipation.

"Well, that's the thing… no one knows his full name. All we know him by is Kisaragi. No one knows his first name." She said as she brought her finger to her chin as if to strike a thinking pose.

"Where can I find him?" I asked with a rushed tone.

"E-Eh? He's over in the dojo mostly… he's part of the Kendo club so he should be doing practice right now." She said as if she was shocked by my sudden interest.

Quickly getting up and moving towards the door I was stopped by her last comment.

"W-Why do you want to get to know Kisaragi-san, Kaizer-san?" She asked a little concerned.

Nearly out the door and off my feet I looked back at her with a sort of fire in my eyes.

"He's someone I've been looking for." I said cryptically as I left the nurse's office and started sprinting down the halls towards the school's dojo.

Sliding through the halls and weaving through the hordes of people, I finally reached the outside courtyard of the school and across the way I could see the dojo.

Wasting no time whatsoever, I made my way across the courtyard only to be stopped by one of the teachers.

"And where do you think you're going young man?" he asked me as if I was in the wrong for being here at this very moment.

Actually, now that I think about it… It was still during school hours and it was only 2nd period so in all technicality, he was right. I wasn't supposed to be here at this time, I was supposed to be in class.

Thinking fast I decided to come up with a lame excuse that would seem almost believable if thought on it for only a few seconds.

"U-Uh… I left something important at the dojo and I need it for my next class… I was given permission by the teacher to go get it if I hurried…" I replied with a smile.

'Please work…!' I thought as I tried to look past him only to have him move in front of my sight again.

"Who is your teacher and what is it that you need to get so much?" He asked a little annoyed.

"My teacher is Mr. Komura and he teaches science. The item I need that is in the dojo is a personal item that I don't wish to discuss with you." I retorted as I tried to get past him, again he got in front of me and stopped my approach of the dojo.

"Well, I'm sorry to say but I can't have you go near the dojo right now. They're practicing and if you disturb them now then they won't be able to properly utilize all the time necessary to practice for the nationals in the next week." He said grabbing a hold of my arm.

This sent me over the edge. It wasn't that my witty banter didn't work or that he was stopping me from going, it was the fact that he grabbed me that sent me into a rage.

Almost unintentionally, I grabbed his wrist, twisted it around and brought it to the small of his back only to have him react in a squeal as he felt it tense up from the sudden rearrangement.

"Oh sorry, it's a reaction… please refrain from touching me or my body my accidentally _'React'_ again." I said with a devilish smile.

Letting go of him I quickly jumped back and dashed towards the dojo. I could hear him in the back telling me to not enter but I pretended to not hear him and busted through the front doors anyways.

Oh, and when I say I busted through the doors, I literally mean busted them open. It turns out they were sliding doors like the classic dojo way back in the Meiji era.

Realizing what I had done, I brought my hand to the back of my head and started to chuckle slightly.

"W-What in the hell do you think you're doing?!" the instructor yelled at me.

"Errr… Which one of you is Kisaragi?" I asked the 20 or so individuals that were practicing Kendo.

To my surprised none of them raised their hands.

'Did I go here at the wrong time?' I thought before realizing the teacher behind me had finally caught up and was reaching to detain me again.

Quickly reacting to him I ducked down low into a prone push up position and brought myself into a forward roll that quickly turned into me sprinting forward away from the two teachers that were now in chase after me.

"Hey! C'mon I know one of you is Kisaragi so which one of you is it?!" I yelled at the 20 students who were watching the spectacle.

As I was running by one of the students I noticed a killing intent coming out of him. It was such a heavy killing intent that I swear I saw it emanating out of his body as if he was a samurai. The next thing I knew, I was being attacked by a kendo stick that was aimed straight for my neck as if to close-line me.

Sliding under it as if I was playing limbo, I spun myself around looked at the student.

He was a rather strange person. He had dark dark hair and it almost seemed like it had a blue tint highlights towards the tip of his hair. His eyes were cerulean and his pupils were more dilated than the average person. He was wearing a traditional Kamishimo. His Kimono was gray with tints of blue flowers etched over the upper torso of his body. His Hakama was crimson red with Japanese letters running down the sides of his legs. To complete his outfit, the Kataginu was dyed in a deep navy blue that got lighter and lighter as it reached the shoulders. On his shoulders were two twin symbols each engraved in a Japanese letter designated as "Peace".

As I looked over at my attacker I noticed that the other two teachers had stopped chasing me and were being blocked by the other students. It was a little strange since before hand they didn't do anything to help me but now it was as if they didn't want the teachers to interfere.

The silence in the room was soon broken when he turned fully towards me with his weapon in hand.

"What are you doing here?" He asked me as if trying to figure out what my game was.

"I already told you, didn't I? I'm looking for Kisaragi." I said eyeing him more closely. "But… It looks like I've found him, haven't I?" I asked rhetorically.

"Yes, you have. Now, I'll ask you again: What are you doing here?" he repeated his question. This time though, he brought his sword up into a fighting stance and took a step towards me.

Looking at him and his weapon, I looked over to see if there were any spares that I could use to defend myself. None were in the area but there was a rack on a wall that held several in their clutches. Straying my view from my opponent, I was left open to his attack as he soon stepped forward and brought his sword down upon me.

Side-stepping him, I took a couple more steps to back away and I was roughly 20 feet away from the rack on the wall.

"When someone asks you a question, you answer them." He told me as he turned to face me again.

"Yeah and when someone is unarmed, you don't attack them with a weapon." I retorted as I stood my ground.

"I'm not going to ask again, state your business here or leave." He said as he lowered his weapon slightly.

"Alright then, I'll get straight to the point." I began as I took out my AT's.

"I want you to join my team." I said as I held them out in front of him.

I don't know if what I said was funny or if what I said was in the wrong place at the wrong time but before I knew it, the students started busting out laughing. It wasn't that I was afraid of the sudden change in attitude or atmosphere but for some reason, I felt like I was in a bad situation. It was then that everything went quiet and he began to speak again.

"You dare come into here with those things? In front of me, of all people, you ask to join your team? Don't make me laugh!" He yelled at me. "Every single one of you is the same… Every single one of you is after a power that you cannot have but you just won't give up!" He kept going on getting louder and louder.

"Why must you bother me so? Why must you go out of your way to make my life miserable?! I don't want anything to do with those things again! Just leave me alone damn it!" He yelled at the top of his lungs.

I just stood there shocked. I didn't know how to respond to him. I knew just from that outburst that he had a bad experience with AT's but I knew that I needed someone like him on my team.

Standing there like a deer in headlights, I looked at his eyes. They were so full of hatred and spite that I wasn't sure how I was to get this guy to see things my way. I honestly wondered if I would even be capable of getting closer to this guy again after today. Running out of time I took a step forward only to have him sprint towards me in complete reaction to me.

"I SAID LEAVE ME ALONE DAMNIT!" He roared as he brought his weapon down upon my head.

Standing there, I braced myself for the impact and moved my head so it would hit mostly my forehead. Bracing myself, I felt the crack on my head and the weapon snapped in half against my skull.

Feeling the force overtake me, I felt the skin on my head break open and blood started to flow down my face and it started to hit the ground.

In no time at all, there was a decent pool of blood and still I stood there with my eyes deadlocked on his. I wasn't sure how much time had passed but I knew that if things kept up at this rate, I would pass out from blood loss. Before that outcome would come to pass, I decided to finally speak my mind to him.

"An eye… for an eye…" I muttered before falling forward and slamming my skull against his.

To stop him from moving anywhere I grabbed the scruff of his outfit and pulled him towards me so we were no more than a few inches from each other. To some girls, this situation might be misunderstood as a Yaoi event. For me though, it was me giving Kisaragi an ultimatum.

"I don't know what happened between you and the AT world but, I want to fly." I said as I started to lose feeling my hands.

"I want to fly so badly that I can't stand being on the ground for so long during school. It's the worst feeling I have ever felt in my entire life… and I think it's the same for you." I said as I tried to pry for information.

"Y-You know nothing about me!" He yelled back as he tried to get my grip off of him.

"Oh really? I think I know a lot more than you think I do." I said as I loosened my grip and let him go.

"You yourself, wish to fly. You want to fly so badly that you lost sight of it when you took up the sword. It was your way of sealing up your feelings but in reality you know in your heart that you want to fly more than anything else." I said as I started to feel shaky from the loss of blood.

"S-Shut it! You don't even know what you're talking about!" He said as his eyes shifted to a fearful expression.

"I know just enough." I said as I took a step forward. "I know that you found AT's to be your way to fly. I know this because you wouldn't have overreacted when I showed you my set of AT's. You wouldn't have struck out against a defenseless person if it wasn't something personal. You wouldn't have gone against your moral codes if it was something that wasn't truly horrible for you. From this, I can tell that you loved AT's and then something happened to you one day that completely changed your life. You couldn't stand AT's anymore and you shut yourself away. The only reason you joined the kendo club was to forget ever flying through the sky!" I yelled at him still slightly losing more and more of my consciousness as I drug this on.

"Shut up! Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up!" He screamed at me.

In my mind I knew I was getting through to him, but in my heart I knew what I was doing was completely wrong. I was making him relive those events from so long ago that it was starting to break him. Was this event truly something so horrible? I couldn't understand what event could have been so horrible to morph someone to this extent. What was worse is that I was running out of time. At any second, I would fall over from blood loss and then I would lose my chance forever.

Taking another step towards him, I was now within arm's reach. I grabbed his shoulders and used him as a crutch so I wouldn't fall over.

"Don't run away from it anymore. It's not your fault. It will never be your fault." I said as I was now just blindly stabbing at anything that might be related to this guy's past. "Because… now you have me to deal with it… with you." I muttered before finally falling to my knees from the lack of strength.

Still holding onto him, I was able to make out one last sentence before passing out from blood loss.

"Now, if you could please… take me to the nurse's office." I said before blacking out.

[Nurse's Office]

Waking up, I noticed I was staring up at the same mono-colored ceiling that I had noticed back in the nurse's office. From this, I deduced that he heard what I said or at least had enough common sense to get me back here in a timely matter since I felt slightly rejuvenated.

Rustling slightly, I struggled to get up and realized that the nurse was sitting in her chair looking at my medical file.

"Ah, I see you're up. What'd you do this time?" She asked me as I finally got up. "The boy who brought you in wouldn't say what happened to you; all he said was that he wanted me to tell you 'I'll wait for you after school at the dojo.' And that was it." She said as she turned to face me.

"Hehe, is that so?" I chuckled as I got to my feet. "Well then, I guess all's well that ends well." I said as I looked down to notice my backpack was next to my feet. Opening them up I confirmed that my AT's were still inside.

"Thanks for all the help, I appreciate." I said to the nurse as I walked out the door.

"Tch. Kids these days." I heard her say as I left the office.

Making my way through the building I noticed that it was already the final period and everyone was starting to leave their classes. It would be another 15 minutes until school finally let out.

'How lucky am I huh?' I thought before going out to the courtyard.

Things were quiet for the first 10 minutes. I decided to sit down on one of the stone benches near the fountain that was situated in the middle of the courtyard. In the corner of my view I could see the Dojo and in the other I could see the doors to the main school building where everyone would be filtering out of.

Sitting there, I took the time to look up at the sky and see the birds passing overhead. Usually I would feel that same depression as always as if I was up on the roof again but this time, I could do nothing but smile as I could now relate to those birds flying overhead.

"I guess we're now on more equal grounds now huh?" I commented to myself as I then got a strange feeling in my gut.

Moving slightly to the left I saw a white bird turd fall down right where I was sitting just a few moment ago and I then directed all of my blissful glee that I felt towards those birds… into just straight anger.

"Ohhhh you're so lucky I can't get up that high yet… just wait I'll get you one day." I cursed the birds as they flocked off to their nests.

I was interrupted in my spiteful rage when I heard the resounding bells signal the end of school and like rats fleeing a sinking ship, all the students ran out of the two double doors and went off to their respective homes.

It was a noisy mess for the next 20 minutes before things died down. I decided that while all the noise was going on, I would stay in the courtyard and wait for everyone to leave before going over to the dojo.

As the kids left and things got less hectic, I got up and made my way to the dojo. Strangely enough as I arrived, Kisaragi wasn't there. I yelled out through the room if anyone was there but I was met with no response. I honestly wondered at some point if Kisaragi decided to leave since I was taking so long to arrive.

Disappointed I decided to sit down on the floor mats. I don't know why but for some odd reason I felt at peace here. I wasn't that I felt a place of longing here… more like I felt like I could rest my head here and not have to worry about the outside world. It wasn't long though before that peace was destroyed when I heard the sound of footsteps enter the area.

"About time you got here." I said to him without looking.

"I had to go get these from my home." He replied as I heard him drop what sounded his backpack on the floor mat.

"Oh? And what is that, I wonder?" I asked him rhetorically.

"The one thing in this world I can't stand." He replied.

"Then why do you still have a pair in your house?"

"To remind myself to never get involved with these things again." He spat at me as if with venom.

"And yet, here we are." I replied bluntly.

It was an awkward silence after my comment. It was to be expect though, I forced this guy to relive a hurtful experience and here we are again about to go through the same situation. It was going to be a hard conversation to get through but it had to be done in order for me to get this guy on my team.

"Oh, that's right…" I began since I totally forgot my manners. "…My name is Kiritsu Kaizer, pleasure to meet you." I said getting up and outstretching my hand.

"…Kisaragi." He muttered before shaking my hand.

"So, Kisaragi, I don't like beating around the bush. I'm much more of the direct, up close and personal types in case you didn't already know that from our… first encounter."

"Yeah… I kinda figured." He replied bitterly.

"Anyways, I'm going to get right to it. What happened to you in the past that made you hate AT's so much?" I asked him.

He didn't immediately start talking. In fact I kind of wondered if he even heard what I had said. He just stood there with his gaze averted from mine and I was starting to get ticked off at him for trying to avoid the question.

"Look, I think I deserve at least that much since you nearly killed me with that blow to the head." I said making him react by looking back at me.

"U-Uh… Yea… you're right. I'm sorry I did that to you… I just couldn't contain my anger… I've never done that before in my life." He said fidgeting a little.

"It's fine but, I want an explanation." I replied being the most direct as I possibly could.

"A-Alright…" He muttered before sitting down.

Mimicking him, I sat down across from him and he began his tale.

"It all started roughly one year ago when my brother and I first got our pair of AT's. We were so happy to receive them that we immediately devoted all of our free time to getting insanely good at riding with them. We got really good at it too. Within two months we were already part of the Parts War and our team had finally made it up to D-Class." He explained.

It was then that he suddenly stopped and got quiet.

"…That's when… the event happened…" He muttered.

"You see… D-Class matches involve 'Cube' which is where two teams go into one-on-one fights in small arenas. Our team was considered to be powerful but the other team we were up against had one of the 8 kings as one of their combatants…"

As he started to explain this part of the story, I could feel his killing intent start to seep out from his body. His fists were shaking and his overall body felt like it was about to explode from anger.

"That fucking bastard… That fucking BASTARD!" He yelled out smacking his fist into the ground.

Sitting there across the way, I waited patiently for the story to end. I had a good idea on what happened and why he hated AT's so much now, but it would be good for him to get this off of his chest. It took him a good 5 minutes before he finally calmed down and continued his story.

"My brother, since he was the strongest of us all, decided to challenge that king to avoid any other fighting to break out amongst our teams. Reluctantly he accepted but I knew that from that instant onwards that something was going to go wrong. I could feel it in my bones. Something was going to go wrong somewhere and I wasn't going to be able to help him." He said as his eyes started to well up with tears. He took a few deep breaths before continuing.

"The King he was up against, was the Fang King, Agito. Agito was known for his cruel methods and as such was known as "Shark". He had such cruel and unusual ways of riding that made me cringe whenever I saw his matches and now my brother was to go up against something like that." He said shuddering slightly at the thought of the Fang King.

"Things didn't go so well. He was quickly overpowered by Agito's insane amount of power and overwhelming strength that it was clear who the winner was in the first 30 seconds of the match… but he didn't stop at 30 seconds… no, he didn't stop until the referee overseeing the match stopped him from completely slashing his body up into pieces. His legs were broken in eight different areas, his ligaments were torn and never fully recovered. His ribs were crushed in and his arms were mangled in such a way that it hurts for him to lift any weights." He started to break down and cry at this point.

"The… The do-doctor said… that he can never ride on AT's again… H-He can never again be a Storm Rider!" He cried out smacking the floor mats.

After 15 minutes of crying and letting out his frustration on the floor, he finally got control of himself and quickly did his best to regain his composure.

"I… I will never forgive that bastard… If I ever see that fucking bastard I swear I will make him know what pain is!" He declared, staring at me straight in the eyes.

I sat there looking at him for a good while, waiting to see if he had anything else to say or anything else he wanted to add in. Seeing as how he was now emotionally spent, I decided to see if I could reignite that fire to take revenge against the Fang King.

"Well then, what do you plan on doing to see the Fang King?" I asked him.

"I… I…" He couldn't make out the words.

I'm not sure if he was stuck trying to figure out what he was going to do to avenge his brother or if he was just too angry and spent to make out the words necessary to hold a conversation anymore.

"I'll make you a deal Kisaragi." I began, catching his attention. "If I can promise you a chance to go up against the Fang King, will you ride with me?" I asked him with a sincere voice.

I could tell just from his face that he was at war within himself. He had two choices in front of him: one would give him a chance to avenge his brother and set things right within himself. The other was to completely lock away his emotions and never get another chance to go up against his brother's attacker.

I sat there awaiting his answer. It was the most nerve-wracking 10 minutes I had ever sat through.

Finally looking up, I could tell what his answer was. There were no words. There was no "congratulations." He knew what he wanted to do and he knew what he was going to do. Or at least, I thought so until he opened his mouth and asked me something I didn't expect.

"Fine, I will join you on one condition: You beat me in an AT match."


	6. A Race to the Water Tower

_Kisaragi, the unknown swordsman and retired Storm Rider has decided to take back his wings and fly again for a brief time. Why has he done this? Well, it's to see if Kiritsu has what it takes to beat him in an AT match._

Sitting there, legs crossed and striking a thinking pose, I decided that it would be best to see how well Kisaragi's skills were. The unknown swordsman hadn't ridden in a long time and it would be best to see how deteriorated he became and where he stood now. Keeping this in mind, it didn't take me long to accept his challenge.

"Alright, I accept." I replied immediately after being asked.

Caught off guard by the instant response, Kisaragi got up and started to put on his AT's.

"Okay. We will do this match now so we can get it over with. Like you, I'm very direct and I hate to waste time on things." He said as he laced his AT's.

Copying his notion, I slid on my AT's and laced them up before turning them on. We both got up and stared at each other just long enough to make it an awkward moment.

"U-Uh…" I interrupted the silence to figure out what was going through Kisaragi's head. "W-Why are you staring at me…?"

"I'm not staring at you." He replied instantaneously. "I'm looking at you and your resolve."

"What's that supposed to mean? You some sort of Samurai or something?" I mocked him as I soon ducked to avoid a kick to the head.

"Yes! I am a samurai with the pride of a lion and I won't be looked down upon by the likes of you." He argued with me as I soon grabbed his foot to push him off balance.

"Yeah well if you're a Samurai then I might as well be your ruler." I replied as I started to make my way for the door.

"So, where is the goal?" I asked him, getting straight to the point.

Passing me up immediately, I noticed Kisaragi jump up to one of the lower buildings and then jump again to reach a higher area of the school's complex. Following right behind, I jumped from roof to roof until I saw him sitting down on the ledge of one of the highest points in the school.

"Well I gotta admit, you can run pretty fast." I applauded him as I took a seat next to him. Of course I didn't sit RIGHT next to him but I was just out of arms and legs reach so I would be safe for the initial response I would get from him.

"I'm not as fast as I used to be… usually I would've gotten up here within 5 seconds instead of 15." He insulted himself as he stared off towards the horizon.

"Do you see that water tower at the far end of the horizon?" He asked me as he pointed to it.

"Yeah… I'd say that's roughly 12-15 miles away." I responded as I brought my hand above my eyes to avoid the sun's glare.

"Well, that's the goal." He muttered as he got up.

"What? THAT'S the goal?" I questioned his statement. "Do you know how FAR that is from here?" I complained.

"Yea I know but, that's what riding's all about right?" He said as he started to slowly fall forward.

"The match… begins now." He said as he was now at a 90 degree angle and falling from where he was standing.

"W-What the?! No fair! You got a head start!" I yelled at him as I too jumped off and started to grind my way down the school's walls.

To my surprise, Kisaragi was really fast. He was already down into the nearby neighborhood grinding atop the roofs of the houses as I landed onto the first building of the area.

"Looks like I can't take it easy…" I muttered as I soon pulled out all the stops and started to fly across the town from building to building.

Grinding atop the roofs of the houses, I soon noticed that I lost track of Kisaragi. I knew I didn't pass him up but I also knew that I wasn't that far from behind him. Looking around I noticed that there was a freeway roughly 200 feet to my right and a network of streets underneath me that I was jumping across to get to the next building.

"Where could he have gone to?" I muttered as I soon looked back to the freeway to notice a telephone line.

Looking ahead, along the telephone line I noticed sparks of electricity fly up from the copper wires and from the source of it all I could see what looked like a person in our school uniform.

It was Kisaragi.

"That rat bastard!" I yelled as I soon started to make my way towards the freeway.

As I was nearing the edge of the neighborhood and noticed that I had gone too far from the lower parts of the freeway and it was steadily raising up in height as I went farther down the district. It was roughly a 20 foot jump and it was only going to get higher if I waited any longer.

Looking ahead, I noticed that there was a large dish that served to give satellite connection for a house. It was curved just sharply enough that it could be used as a ramp and with a devilish grin I started to speed up.

"Hehe… Looks like they're going to need to get a new dish!" I yelled as I jumped into the satellite dish and used it as a makeshift ramp.

Catching an insane amount of air, I went past the edge of the freeway and even over top of the telephone wire.

'Fuck!' I thought as I looked down to notice that I was headed straight for the middle of the freeway. Thinking fast, I turned myself around to adjust the trajectory to my advantage.

With a little bit of praying and a little bit of skill I was able to land on one of my AT's sending me into a spin on my single AT as if I was a ballerina on ice sliding across an 18-wheeler.

Luckily enough for me, I was moving forward with the giant piece of moving metal instead of going back. Since I had too much momentum to fully stop on top of the 18-wheeler, I leapt off of the front end of the cargo container and sent myself flying atop the telephone lines.

"Damn it all! I lost too much time doing flashy crap like that…" I cursed myself as I started to speed up along the wires.

Catching up to Kisaragi, (I could only tell that I was reaching his location since I could now see more sparks flying in his wake) I took the time to reposition myself so my weight was fully pressed against the heel of the AT's which made them kick into high gear.

All around me the scenery started to blur. Cars felt like they were moving slower if they were moving with me and the other side of the highway was just a blur of cars moving in the opposite direction. The forests could no longer be seen as each individual tree and instead manifested as a giant blur of green and brown since it had started to turn toward the late autumn season. The clouds above me were barely visible and just looked like to be small visualization of white streaks across the blue sky. Oh and I almost forgot to mention the sparks that were spiking up and trailing behind me were starting to melt the rubber on the wires making it spontaneously combust into a beautiful array of electricity and flame.

After finally taking all of this in, I noticed it again. The path below me vanished. The wires that were once holding my AT's up in the air completely evaporated beneath me. The sparks that were flying from the friction made had gone with them and in its place was once again that torrent of wind.

The path of wind raced back and forth beneath me as if it were guiding me along to my destination. The vitality of the swirling gusts of air pushed me along and battered me along the sides as if telling me to stay where I was. The sky that was once above me had vanished but was replaced by something else. It was something indescribable, something that couldn't ever be expressed in words.

All I could do while going down this "road" in front of me was keep my jaw ajar as I looked at this spectacle in awe. I didn't really know what I was feeling that day but if it was something I could describe, it would be the closest thing to bliss.

In no time at all the apparition that lay before me vanished like it came. As if I was snapping back to reality from dream, I noticed that I had run out of wire and I was already halfway through the air in a mid-jump.

In the most elegant way and in the most frightful way possible, I let out the manliest…. And yet the most girlish screech I have ever uttered from my mouth.

"AAAAAAHHH!" I screeched as I soon realized my intended target that my body instinctively wanted me to land upon. To my luck, my body chose to have me land on yet another 18-wheeler going down the highway.

Catching my breath and making sure I didn't wet myself, I looked around to see where Kisaragi was. To my dismay I wasn't able to locate him. I didn't know if he was so far ahead that I couldn't see him, or I was just too blind to noticed him if he was ahead of me.

"Did you really just scream like a little girl?" I heard the familiar voice say behind me.

"It's not girly, it was my new battle cry to confuse opponents into thinking that I'm weak." I said trying to convince him and partially myself.

"Uh huh…" He replied sarcastically. "Well, I gotta admit… I didn't think you'd overtake me by speeding up that much. That was pretty insane." He commented before jumping off the side onto another large vehicle.

"But I'm still not going to lose to you!" He shouted before jumping from vehicle to vehicle as if he was playing Frogger.

'Wait a second… I overtook him?' I thought before realizing the race was still on.

"Aw shit! The game's still going!?" I shouted rhetorically before dashing forward and mimicking my counterpart.

Looking ahead and fully conceptualizing my surrounding and current situation, I noticed we were roughly a mile away from the water tower and Kisaragi still had a good 200 feet lead on me. I knew I wouldn't be able to catch up with speed alone so I had to think of a shortcut.

I looked back at the water tower and noticed there were two overall paths leading up to it. One was a forest with a park that had a relatively straight shot heading towards it. The other path was a more industrialized area that had construction tarps covering most of the area obscuring my view from details.

Thinking fast and being indecisive as I usually was, I decided to do it the old fashioned way. Flip a coin! Little did I know though about the concept of physics that soon took place since the second I flipped it out from my thumb, it flew out of my vision and was lost in the highway…

…

…..

"Stupid." I insulted myself for the countless time. Running out of luck I did the oldest trick in the book that every man knew.

I went with my gut feeling.

Breaking off from the highway I immediately jumped onto an exit ramp and grinded my way down the metal border that soon kicked me off into the construction area. It was then my worst fears were realized… It was an active construction zone.

All around me I could see everything that you would normally see in the movie of a construction zone. There were cranes, big pipes of metal, tons of people, lots of hard hats and of course the iconic giant black ball of death and destruction that would slam itself into building… Perfect.

All throughout the area people were getting in my way. I was moving at such a fast speed that it was hard to dodge but somehow some way I actually didn't slam into anyone and soon I found myself jumping up onto one of the construction beams so I could start grinding down it. To my unfortunate luck though, as I got upon this giant rod of metal, it got up and started to move with the crane that was hoisting it.

So there I was, 30 feet in the air and climbing. People were getting smaller, clouds started to get closer and fear of heights started to become more apparent. To add onto that, as if things weren't bad enough, the fucking thing was spinning. I repeat…

The giant metal beam was spinning…

Counterclockwise.

In no time at all, with no warning whatsoever, the crane stopped. This usually would be good but in my case… not so much. Before I could realize what had happened, my grip on the steel wires that were holding the beams up was completely lost and I soon found myself flying forward towards the building that was being constructed on.

Needless to say, I think it was safe to assume I was scared out of my mind.

Instinctively landing on the metal beam that was sticking out from the large hollow construct, I immediately leaned forward and took off across the small platform I was under. It was a race against time. I had lost too much time moving through the people and if I didn't pick up my pace I was going to lose to Kisaragi and that wasn't an option.

Nearing the end of the metal beam I noticed that there was a finished wall at the end with a small cut out window with a perfect view of the water tower. Kicking my feet against the metal beam, I started to pick up speed and as soon as I reached the window I jumped out as if I was flying out of an exploding building in an action flick.

Greeting me on the other end of the window was a nice view of the water tower. All around it were loads of trees and running straight up the middle was a nice sloped path. Below me and a few yards behind, I could see Kisaragi coming up the path. If I was to land, I would land roughly 50 feet ahead of him which would give me a guaranteed victory.

"Looks like it's my win Kisaragi!" I shouted at him as I looked down at my landing area.

Once again with my luck being the worst in the world, I realized that right below me was a kid that had decided to play catch with his father. Why here and now? I still haven't figured that out to this day but if I landed on that kid, it would be like pushing meat through a chain-link fence…

I knew I would lose the race but it wasn't hard for me to choose between the race and the kid's life. There was only one problem though, I couldn't change my landing area enough to avoid contact with the kid. It didn't matter if I moved left or if I moved right. I had way too much momentum built up from the fall and it wouldn't move me enough to avoid him.

Looking back I had hoped Kisaragi would make it in time to move him out of the way but he was way too far back to reach the kid. I wouldn't be able to rely on Kisaragi with this one and if I didn't act fast the kid was going to die.

Thinking with all of my intellect, I retraced everything I had learned with Hiyu. I rehashed everything from the basics of aerial maneuvering to the complex and advanced movements of riding the air. Everything I thought of though still didn't prove helpful.

I didn't have any trump card up my sleeve either. I didn't know anything other than the basic and advanced movements of AT's. I didn't have a plan in case something like this would happen nor did I have any way of getting myself out of this situation.

Cursing at my own weakness, I closed my eyes and prepared for the worst. I pictured it in my mind. I knew exactly how it was going be felt and I knew how gruesome this was going to be. I would be lucky enough to not throw up after it would all go down.

Strangely enough though, it never happened. In fact, the exact opposite of that happened. It was completely unthinkable. I didn't even know something like could be achieved and when I opened my eyes to see exactly what I had felt under my AT's, I couldn't believe it.

Beneath my feet I saw myself riding atop a blue arc of energy. I'm not too sure exactly what it was but all I could tell was that it was a blue arc carrying me along. It was such a familiar feeling too. I couldn't grasp what it exactly felt like but I knew I had felt this somewhere before. It was then that it hit me.

It felt just like the "road" that I was on top of earlier on the telephone lines and like that "road" it vanished before I could wrap my brain around what it was.

As soon as it vanished beneath my feet, I impacted the ground on my AT's and in tow I fell forward with the momentum making me smack against the ground violently.

Hitting the ground over and over again, I went into a perpetual front flip landing on all sides of my body until finally losing all the built up momentum and coming to a stop at the top of the slope.

I didn't feel pain at first. I didn't think I was even alive after taking such a beating like that but soon the thought was banished when my nerves finally kicked in. As if a wave crashed over me; my skin, my bones, my body, my blood, my organs and anything else pertaining to the human body screamed out in agonizing pain as I laid there on the ground.

To my own surprise, no screams of pain echoed out from me. Not a single word or noise came out when I opened my mouth. Or at least, what felt like me opening my mouth.

Everything was numb. My feeling my legs and my chest soon subsided and all I could feel was the warmth of my blood filling my face and seeping out from the sides of my mouth. My vision was crimson red and it was starting to get blurry. I could hear muffled sounds of people but I couldn't tell who until finally Kisaragi came into view.

I listened very closely to what his muffled noises were coming out of his mouth. It was only in bits and pieces of what I could hear but his lips said the rest.

'Thank god for being able to read lips.' I chucked to myself as I pieced together his message.

It went along as, or what I thought was said as followed:

"You're going to be okay. I've got the ambulance coming here right now. Hang in there."

I didn't really know what to say. Then again, I don't think I would be able to say anything with the current state I was in. Regardless of what my body felt though, I forced myself with all of my strength to get up and lean in so I could say something to him.

It was slow at first, but soon I was able to lift my arm and grab ahold of his uniform. I pulled him towards me and I pulled myself towards him until I was no more than a few inches away from his ear. In a muffled, and yet pained voice, I was able to get out two words.

"I…. Win." I muttered before falling back on the concrete and passing out from pain.

[Hospital, ER]

"Heart rate at 89 beats and dropping." I heard one of the doctors say.

"Severe blood loss and trauma to the head." Another responded.

"Increase dosage from .52 to .83"

"Heart rate increasing. 78. 79. 81. 83. 84. 83 and stabilizing."

I didn't hear much more after that. I don't know if I passed out or if they were talking too fast but from what I heard, I had to have been pretty battered up. Either way there was nothing I could do from that point and it would be awhile before I would be discharged, that was for sure. The feeling of drowsiness once again overtook me and soon all sounds died out.

[Hospital, Patient Room]

I awoke to the rays of sunlight hitting my face. I didn't know whether to be glad or to be pissed off since I was asleep and resting. I looked around as my vision soon faded from blurriness and I quickly realized that I was in the exact same room that I had been in before when I was hospitalized.

Chuckling at the thought, I looked out the window to see that the sun had just pierced its way through the clouds and was steadily rising over them.

'Probably around 8:00.' I thought before looking over at the familiar IV and tube flowing down into my arm.

"Wow… big shocker there." I commented before trying to get up.

Pain immediately shocked through my entire body. I could feel the old wounds that laced my entire torso and lower abs and it hurt so badly that I almost felt like crying from the pain. Holding onto my dignity though, I sucked it up and rested my head against the pillow impatiently awaiting for my body to heal.

"Ugh… so annoying." I groaned before hearing footsteps nearing the doorway.

As they got closer, they immediately stopped and I could hear one of the nurses in the hallway say something to the person.

"You can't go in there he's still resting from his time in the ER." The nurse cautioned the person.

"It's alright. I'm awake." I said with all the force I could muster into my voice.

Immediately responding to the noise that I made, a familiar face came in holding flowers in his hands. It was of course, Kisaragi. Why he had flowers? I had no idea but he was about to be made fun of because of it.

"Really Kisaragi? Flowers? Are you kidding me?" I taunted him as he placed them in a vase next to me.

"Yeah, thought you might like them since you love these sort of things." He taunted me back.

We both stood there for a few moments in silence, or to be more exact, I laid there in the bed and he stood there looking at me from a decent ways in silence.

Breaking the mind-numbing absence of sound, I mustered up my voice again.

"So. Is that all you wanted to do? Just bring me flowers? Jeez you're a bad boyfriend." I teased him again as I chuckled at my own joke.

"Well, I actually thought you might want to know that the kid you nearly impaled with your AT's is fine and…" he cut himself off there as if he was battling himself inside.

"And…?" I tried forcing him to complete his thought.

"And…" He once again cut himself off.

"And…?" I said again getting irritated.

"And… I just thought I'd let you know that… I…" He muttered the final part so it was almost inaudible.

"You wanted me to know that you will…. What?"

"I… Will…" He muttered it again almost inaudible.

"You will what?! Spit it out!" I shouted at him, groaning at the pain in my chest and stomach.

"I… I will be joining your team." He finally spat it out at me as if it was the hardest thing for him to say in his entire life.

"B-But don't think you've won against me in a match damn it! I'm only doing this because you would have had the upper hand if you hadn't had that obstacle in your way." He immediately followed as if trying to justify his actions.

"You do know though that you're still saying I won?" I jabbed at him again.

"No I'm not."

"Yeah you are."

"No, I'm not."

"Yeah… you are."

"I said I'm not damn it!"

"And I'm still saying you are."

This went back and forth for another good 5 minutes before the nurse, who previously took care of me the first time, came in and proceeded to beat the ever-living crap out of the both of us. Once again, in a matter of 30 seconds she had beaten Kisaragi into submission and I was back in dream land for god knows how long. I don't know if what I dreamt in my thoughts was actually manifesting itself outside of my mind but if they were, then I probably had a nice grin on my face.

I had now obtained my first member… Now I needed to find the next three.

**Woohoo! Finally done! Sorry I haven't updated in a while, been a pain in the ass with work as well as finding time to sit down and write. I regret to inform anyone who is actually reading this that I won't be able to update for at least the next week since I will be on vacation. Hope you enjoyed this new chapter, I will see you guys again next week.**


	7. Who Am I?

'_One member down, another three to go.' That was the only thought coursing through his head. He didn't know how he was going to do it but he was going to do all he could to be a part of the Parts War._

Things couldn't be that simple though, it didn't matter how badly I wanted to be a part of the AT world. It didn't matter how badly I wanted to show the world who I was, if I couldn't get another three people to join my cause I wouldn't get that chance.

Questions clouded my thoughts to the point that I was stuck in a thick fog. How was I going to find these three new people? Would they come to me if I put up flyers? Could I challenge random Storm Riders and force them to join me? Could I blackmail people to see things my way?

I continued to think this through and my mind started to devolve further and further until I started thinking of the darker and more evil ways of enticing people to see things my way. Needless to say it wasn't the prettiest sight so see if any of those thoughts came to fruition in reality.

"Ah… I should stop thinking like this." I said aloud before snapping myself back to reality.

I was atop the roof as I always was with my eyes dead set on the skies. My AT's were wrapped around my feet as if they were my shoes. I never really took them off except if I had to. I was so attached to these things that it felt like I was naked without them. It was almost as if they were a part of me, in fact I would say that's exactly that they were. They were now a part of me and I felt that if I let them go, I would never see them again.

Shaking those thoughts from my mind, I quickly scooted to the right and narrowly avoided yet another white turd that fell from the sky.

"DAMN BIRDS! It's getting annoying!" I shouted at the flock of birds passing overhead.

'One of these days, I'm not going to be as lucky.' I thought before hearing footsteps reach my ears.

I inched myself around and looked to see who had decided to enter my abode… granted the abode was a wide open area with a perfect view of the sky and the ground was pure concrete with a 10 foot fence etched around the perimeter… but still it was an abode.

Turns out, but not to my surprise, it was Kisaragi.

"Yo Mr. Samurai loser." I commented before turning myself around to look at the sky again.

"And hello to you too introverted cheater." He replied as he walked up.

"Are you always out here?" He asked as he too looked up at the view.

"Yeah… I find some peace of mind here. I don't know why but I feel like I can be myself if I'm up here." I said as I stared up at the sight before me.

In all honesty, I knew already why I loved being up here and why I could feel like myself. The sky made me who I was. I loved feeling the wind through my hair as I ran above the streets and on the roofs of houses. I felt alive when I would jump from one ledge to another. I felt the adrenaline pumping through my veins that made me feel a natural high. The feeling of the danger, the pace, the height, the power… all of it was what made me… well, me. Now that my legs were screwed up though, I was restricted to the ground. The AT's were my new legs. My new set of wings that would take me to the skies again.

"I… I know the feeling." I heard him mutter.

"What was that?"

"Nothing. The next period is starting, we should get going." He replied before turning away.

"H-Hey, don't just say something and just walk away… totally not cool bro." I said getting irritated at his attitude.

In a suave motion and a spin of his upper torso, he was walking backwards as if to taunt me.

"One: I'm not your 'bro' and Two: I'll be cooler than you ever will be. Baaaka.." He jeered at me as he accidentally bumped into someone.

It was a rather comedic scene to see him fall over himself as he fell over the smaller person. In no time at all, the person who was bumped over had served as an obstacle that made Kisaragi lose his balance just far enough for him to fall over backwards down the stairs to the fourth floor.

Again, not to my surprise, the unlucky person that Kisaragi had tripped over was Aoi Miyamoto. It was probably her daily routine of trying to get me to go to class in time and she just happened to arrive at the wrong time. Chuckling to myself, I decided to play the knight in shining armor and I walked over to her with my hand extended.

"Hey, you okay?" I asked her as I pulled her to her feet.

"Y-Yeah…" She said as she rubbed her head where it was impacted. "W-Was… that Kisaragi?"

"Yeah, thanks for referring me to him. It turns out we share a lot more interests than just AT's." I said with a wink.

Her immediate response was priceless. Her face turned red and I swear I heard a squeal of delight that only a Yaoi fan girl would make.

Strutting past her, I looked down to see that Kisaragi was recovering from his flight down the stairs. Strangely enough he wasn't bleeding and the damage he had received looked to be minimal.

'Lucky bastard.' I thought before sliding down the railing and landing next to him.

"Hey, you should apologize for knocking her down Baaaaka." I taunted him as I dodged a sweeping kick to the face.

"Haha! Missed!" I ridiculed him again before jumping backwards and landing down on the fourth floor.

Turning the corner, I ducked out of sight and went straight to class. This actually wasn't like me since I wasn't the punctual type but, there was always a first for something.

I turned another corner and almost immediately rammed myself into a teacher.

"Woah! Teach, might want to watch out where you're going." I said teasingly as I spun around him on my AT's.

"Hey! AT's aren't allowed here!" He yelled at me as I dashed down the hallway and turned the last corner on my journey.

Hiding along the wall as if I was on an incognito mission, I took a deep breath and held it for as long as I could. Trailing behind me in an attempt to catch me, the teacher ran straight past my location and veered another corner out of my sight. Letting out a deep sigh, I moved myself from my hiding spot and started to chuckle to myself at my own adept ability at hiding.

My own self gratification was halted though, when I noticed a red haired girl staring at me across the hall. I wondered why she was staring at me but one of the major things that made me wary of her was the fact I didn't sense her there. I was always really good at being able to sense where people were or if their attention was diverted to my location but this girl had bypassed all of that at a mere 15 feet away from me.

She was roughly 5'5". She had orange highlights in her hair and it made it look like her hair was set ablaze with fire. Her eyes were dyed in a deep purple that were almost abysmal-like. In her arms were a set of two books and pressed up against them were a pair of nicely fitted C-cup breasts. I gotta say she was rather attractive but something about her presence gave me chills. Something was off about her and that was the only reason keeping me back from actually interacting with her.

Looking down the hall at her I heard the bell ring. We didn't move an inch though. It was rather strange since the normal person would immediately rush into class but this girl still held eye contact. Staring at her and her staring at me, we both stood there for a good moment before I heard her murmur something.

"…evil…" I heard only that word as she turned the corner and went to her class.

"W-what? Evil?" I repeated as I stood there awestruck.

I didn't know exactly how long I stood there but before I knew it, I heard the final bell ring which signaled me being late for the next class.

"Oh well." I sighed as I opened the door to my class. "If you're late, might as well make it dramatic." I chuckled to myself as I gave an off-the-cuff excuse of why I was late to my teacher. As usual, she didn't believe a word I said but it wasn't like she could do anything to me that was catastrophic.

Oh, was I ever so wrong.

It turns out that the teacher can have you stay behind for almost as long as they want as long as they were there with you. What I thought was going to be a really boring day turned out to be hell on earth since I didn't get out of that classroom until 7P.M.

"Are you going to repent for your actions now Kiritsu-san?" I heard my teacher say as I opened up the sliding door.

"Y-Yeah… I get the point…" I muttered as I walked out the door.

As to my expectations, it was so late that the sun had already set and the moon was starting to rise up in the sky assuming its rightful place among the clouds. It was a rather brisk night, just chilly enough to warrant a jacket but as usual I was unprepared for such environment conditions.

Sighing to myself I laced up my AT's and turned them on as I reached the roof of the building.

"Well, at least it's a beautiful night sky." I commented as I looked up at the moon. It was a full moon tonight, perfect conditions for riding.

With a large grin appearing on my face, I took to the skies and immediately started to make my way towards the hospital. The hospital was situated on the far end of town and it would take me roughly 20 minutes to get back home from there but for some reason I just felt like riding tonight.

I wanted to feel the cold air brushing against my face and flowing through my hair. I wanted to feel the weight lifted off of my shoulders and I wanted to touch the clouds… then again that wouldn't be possible for a long time.

As I was going under the overpass and heading down to the hospital on my usual route, I noticed far off in the distance a person standing in an array of flood lights against a billboard. He had several ropes hanging off of his legs as well as an orange strait jacket restraining his arms. I couldn't tell from how far away I was but judging from his position and his lack of movement in his upper torso, I could tell he was a Storm Rider. A weird one at that, but nonetheless he was a Storm Rider for sure.

I was really curious as to why someone like that was up on a billboard, so curious in fact that I decided to get closer to see what was up. It didn't look like he was with someone and, it didn't look like he was older than me so me being the older Senpai made me feel the obligation to help out.

Jumping from one roof to another, I neared his position and decided to jump up next to him before he finally looked over at me. I didn't know if I scared him or not but the second I gained eye contact with him I knew something was wrong. His eyes were that of a beast. There were no pupils, or if there were pupils in his eyes they were shaped in a small sliver running up and down the middle of his eyes. Actually now that I had a better view of him, he had an eye patch over one of his eyes. Immediately in pure reaction I dashed back towards the edge of the billboard rafter that I was standing on and nearly fell off.

I don't know why I reacted that way but something inside me was screaming. It was yelling at me to run away. Get as far and as fast as you can away from this person. It was a strange feeling for me. I hadn't felt this type of cowardice or fear emanating from my body in a long time and this little kid was making me tremble just by gaining eye contact with him.

"W-Who are you?" I asked in a slight tremble. It was all I could really get out with my fear encroaching my body.

"Ha? Who am I?" He parroted back to me. "Who the fuck do you think you are to tell me to identify myself? HA?!" He said getting louder.

"I am Kiritsu Kaizer, a storm rider just like you." I said reaffirming my position.

The fear in me was wearing off. I knew that I could probably win against this guy if he wanted to start a fight but then again it wasn't like me to attack a person just for them getting angry. I was calm, cool and collected. I would use this to my advantage.

"Eh? You? Just like me? Yeah right. Little pieces of trash like you could never be like me. You're far too weak to even be considered prey for my 'Road'." He said trash talking me.

"What was that you little pipsqueak? You think you're better than me in terms of skill?" I jeered back at him.

"Fuck yea I'm better than you. You're just trash with no battle experience." He said with a toothy grin appearing on his face.

"I'm not much for thrashing weak kids and tarnishing my road… but I can't stand for this. I can't stand for this disgraceful attitude towards me… you're dead… you're so fucking dead it isn't even funny. YOU'RE DEAD!" He roared at me as he dashed towards me with his AT's.

Jumping backwards and grabbing the billboard, I swung myself around and dodged his initial attack. As I landed and turned around I noticed he was already attacking me again with his AT's. I pulled a limbo trick I learned back in the 3rd grade and dodged his kick just barely but somehow I was still with some sort of sharp shred of metal.

It stung. It stung so bad that it truly hurt me in a debilitating way. It was then I finally noticed what exactly what was hurting me. It was those stupid ropes attached to his legs. They were like claws latching into my skin and ripping me apart. I had to get out of his range and fast or I would be covered in blood in no time at all.

Dashing forward and out of his range, I jumped down and continued to the underpass. I didn't know why this was a good idea. It was a decently large corridor roughly 40 feet across and 100 feet down in each direction from where I was standing. I knew that if I didn't do something fast, this would be my grave.

I was interrupted with my train of thought when I heard the revving overhead. With my instincts taking hold, I spun myself around and brought my AT straight up to meet his. Our moves counteracted each other. He was balancing on top of my AT while I was balancing on my other. My legs were completely flat at 180 degrees as if I was doing a split and somehow I was holding it there for a good few seconds.

We were both there for roughly two more seconds before my body once again reacted on its own and spun itself around to knock him off balance. Completing my fluid motion, I took my AT that held him off initially and brought it straight down on his gut. He let out a sound of pain. I wasn't sure if it was how hard I hit him or how fragile his body was but I felt something crack underneath.

That wasn't the scariest thing though… The scariest thing that scared me the most… was that I didn't feel a thing for it. I didn't care. I didn't care for his wellbeing or how much pain he was in. It was like I was a different person that was put into a trance.

Shaking with all of my might, I snapped back into reality and jumped back away from him. I put up a defensive stance and immediately started to roll backwards to increase the gap between us. It wasn't long though when he finally got up and spat some blood on the ground.

In that next few moments, the lights in the area cut off and all I could see was his single beast-like eye staring at me in the dark. It was emanating its own glow that shook every fiber in my body. This time though, it wasn't fear that I felt in my body… it was thrill. I couldn't wait to see what this kid would do. I wanted to see what he was going to do to react to my presence and the deadly blow that I dealt to his ribs. I wanted to see what I could do to him and it felt like I could seep into a melancholy when fighting with this person.

Trembling to the brim with excitement and anticipation I waited for him to get closer. I waited for him with such a hasty and baited breathe that I didn't even realize from the corner of my eye that another leg was coming towards my face.

The AT Impacted against my jaw and I was sent flying into the wall of concrete 10 feet away. I didn't know if I broke any ribs or if my back was completely screwed but I knew that my jaw was at least cracked from the hit.

I was in a daze and I slowly staggered to my feet. I looked across the way with my blurry and hazy vision to notice a slightly familiar face… it was that girl in the hallway. She was wearing a leather jacket with skin tight jeans. Her red hair was being suffocated by a ball cap that covered most of her face but the thing that made me recognize her were the fiery eyes that glistened in that dark concrete corridor.

"L-Low blow there… little girl…" I commented as I staggered my stance to keep myself up.

She didn't say anything to me. All she did was smile underneath her cap and turned to face the kid.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!" I heard him say in a rage. "If you want to get in the way I won't stop you, in fact, you can just die along with him!" He roared as he dashed forward to attack the girl.

Instinctively moving my body, I dashed forward and just as he was about to collide his AT into her face I blocked his strike with my own. I wasn't able to hold him off completely but I definitely blocked most of the energy that was being sent out. What struck me as strange though, was the fact that she didn't move. Actually it looked like she didn't intend to move to begin with.

"G-Get out of here…" I muttered at her as I pushed his AT away from me.

"It looks like you haven't awakened yet…" I heard her comment as she strutted off to the side and out of the way.

'The hell is she talking about?' I thought before redirecting my attention at the kid rampaging towards me.

Once again he attacked by lunging towards me except this time he did it in a new fashion. Instead of just a straight lunge he went into a spinning vortex of kicks that brought the ropes with their hooks up towards my face. I was able to blocked them with my arm but it was getting slashed to pieces by the insane amount of momentum that he had gained from his spinning. If I didn't do something fast, my arm was going to be torn to shreds.

I quickly disengaged from the combat by jumping up and over him and dashed back to gain some distance. I knew there had to be some sort of window of opportunity and this would be the only time I would have to find it.

Realizing this, I knelt down.

I sat in that position for a good moment before he quickly dashed at me again with the same move and it was then that I realized the weakness in his technique. I looked down at his positions and noticed that there was a slight time delay before the ropes and hooks would start to spin around with him to create his vortex. If I had any chance to stop this move, it would be before he gained enough momentum.

Snapping back to reality, dodging narrowly and getting cut up in the process; I took up a different stance from before and waited for him to charge again.

"Why are you running?!" He roared at me getting even more pissed off.

"What? You think I'm going to let you hit me with that again? Think again retard." I jeered at him as I saw the anime-like 'anger' appear on his forehead.

"DIE!" He roared before sending out a yellow arc of energy at me.

It looked roughly the same as Kisaragi's except this one was a lot larger. It was also travelling a lot faster than his so I narrowly avoided the hit and suffered getting my left arm ripped to shreds.

My vision got even blurrier than before and the only thought coursing through my head was to just get away… at least, that was what my head was saying… my heart on the other hand was pulsing at a million paces a second and it kept radiating one word through my blood: "Kill."

My body was no longer mine to control. My blood had boiled over and it clouded my thoughts. It was almost like a tremor hit my heart. My legs filled up with blood, vast amounts of energy was coursing through my body that almost bursted the very cells that were holding it together.

The ground beneath me started to rumble and shake as if the earth was cowering in fear. My AT's were screaming at me, revving themselves up as if they wanted to taste his blood. They were angry as if they were an entity themselves.

In one quick fluid kick, I sent out an energy arc of my own. This one was of crimson red imbued with black wisp-like flames jetting out from the sides. The arc of energy was on a collision course to hit my opponent but just as it was about to impact, the girl jumped in front of it and completely dissipated the energy with her AT's.

My body stood there for another few seconds before the energy coursing through it finally returned to normal and in tow came my support from my legs. I immediately collapsed on the ground and I felt a searing pain running through my legs. It was so aggravating and painful that I hadn't felt that much pain since I initially destroyed them two years ago.

"Looks like… waking up…" I heard her say to the kid as I was writhing in pain.

I didn't scream though. No matter how painful the burning sensation felt, I didn't scream. I didn't know if it was me trying to be a bad ass or if the pain was so excruciating that I couldn't make any audible noises. Either way, I was stuck on the ground writhing about like an injured dog.

Before I could notice what was going on, the girl was standing above me, looking at me as if I were a lower life form. It was almost as if she was saying: "Hey, insect. How's your miserable life going?"

It was degrading. It was so humiliating to be in such a vulnerable position and I hated every millisecond of it.

Time seemed to slow down and it felt like ages that she was just standing over me like that but, at some point the walls around the corners of my vision started to get darker. That familiar haze of darkness started to set in over my vision, slowly but surely it was all going completely dark.

Before I lost all of my vision I used most of my remaining strength to pull myself up to a leaning stand. I knew I didn't have much time left before I would pass out so I made it as quick and as simple a question that I could sum up to answer my suspicions.

"W-Who… am… I…?" I muttered before feeling my wounds take hold.

I passed out and felt the cold concrete against my face. I didn't feel the impact of the ground nor did I hear any other sounds. All I could sense out of my five senses was the feeling of the cold concrete rubbing against my face, until finally all my senses were lost to me.

**Finally! Done with chapter 7. I apologize to everyone who has been patiently waiting for this update and I would like to say that I have finally been able to get free from my work to start working on this more. Hopefully I will be able to update more often than this. Let me know what you think and let me know if you have any OC's or ideas that you would like me to try and incorporate into this. I may hold a poll to see where this fanfic will go but for the meantime, please R&R! I LIVE FOR THE REVIEWS!**


	8. The Blood King

_After a close encounter with a powerful opponent, Kiritsu is left on the ground passed out from using too much power. Was that power from him, or was it from something else? Only time will tell._

Ah… the perpetual darkness. I know it all too well since I have started to ride. It seems that every time I put on my pair of AT's I always end up injured or beaten down to the point that I'm hospitalized. To be completely honest, it gets a little monotonous. It almost seems like there should be a warning label on the side of the product box that says 'Warning: People who ride on these mechanisms have an increased chance to be hospitalized.'

It's so annoying to wake up every time in the hospital with that same crazy nurse that seems to always be able to handle anything that comes her way. She beat down my best friend, destroyed my new teammate and incarcerated me in my bed within 30 seconds of me gaining a visual on her. The lady is a freak and every time I see her it sends chills down my spine. Then again, I can't help but wonder what she'd be able to do in bed…

With my mind drifting towards that thought process, I soon found myself stirring in my sleep and almost immediately reacted out of fear at the upcoming doom that I would have to face if I woke up in the hospital.

Strangely enough, it didn't happen. In fact, the place I woke up to was a room. It was a white room with four walls. It had a generic single bed, pleasant aroma-filled scent and there was no one inside expect me.

I was underneath three sheets with a comforter on top. The comforter had no designs and was colored a generic white just like the rest of the room. I looked behind me and noticed I was lying atop four pillows that were also white.

'Wow…' I thought before hearing footsteps from behind the wall next to me.

"Oh shit…" I muttered before lying back down and acting asleep.

I heard the door open and the footsteps got closer before stopping near the foot of the bed.

"Subject is still asleep." I heard her say as she started to slowly walk down the right side of the bed.

"Heart rate is still within norms. Bandages are…" She stopped herself as she lifted the sheets and let them back down again. "…Still clean. Will most likely need to be changed within the next hour."

"All that's left is…" She stopped herself again before I felt her get close to my face.

"…Body Temperature." She finished as she put her forehead against mine.

Reacting to her closeness, I grabbed her by her small neck and pushed myself on top of her so I had a better hold to keep her still. I didn't know why but I felt the need to be in control and start to ask questions.

"W-Who are you?" I questioned her as I was now on top of her with my hands on her neck and my legs straddled on top of her arms so she couldn't move.

Now that I had a good view of her, I noticed the same similar red hair that I had seen that night. It was the same girl that was in the hall, it was the same girl that interrupted my fight and it was the same girl who I was now interrogating.

"Well… I guess that means you're awake… and by the looks of it you're either healthy, or really happy to see me." She said as she looked slightly down from my gaze.

Blushing slightly, I got flinched as she overpowered me and flipped me over onto my back. Our roles were now reversed with her straddling me and her legs on top of my arms, chaining me to the bed.

"Well, it looks like not all of your strength has returned since I was able to beat you in a game of power." She commented as she got up and off of me.

"That still doesn't explain who you are. Who are you and where am I?" I questioned her as I sat up.

"Well, to start off… do you even know who _you_ are?" she asked me as she started to open the door.

"That's not the-" I got interrupted in my train of thought.

"Not the point? Oh, it has everything to do with what I am about to tell you… Kiritsu Kaizer." She said as she closed the door behind her as she left the door.

"What the fuck? She knows my name?" I said aloud as I tried to follow.

It didn't work out that well. As soon as I got up to my feet I immediately fell down to the ground with a loud thud. I felt no strength at all in my legs and my body ached all over. I could feel the searing pain in my gut, my arms felt like dead pieces of weight and my head was throbbing from the overwhelming pressure enveloping my body.

"S-Shit…" I muttered before feeling myself let loose of reality.

'No… not like this.' I thought to myself as I pushed against the flow of energy. 'I refuse to go down like this… I refuse to sit here any longer.' I kept saying to myself as I pushed myself to my knees.

'Body of mine… you've rested enough. It's time to get up.' I reaffirmed myself as I pushed myself to my feet and stumbled to the door.

I felt with every step that my body was going to crumble from my wounds but I also felt a new energy welling up from within. I felt like my energy that I had sealed away from my body was now seeping forth from the wounds and lacerations on my body and it was now starting to heal me. It was now starting to act for me instead of just sitting there like some lump of iron holding me in place.

With my new found energy overriding my body, I opened the door and stumbled outside. I felt my body tug me in several different directions. Each way was foreign to me… no matter where I looked down, each corridor had no end and I didn't see the girl that had left me alone in the room.

"Damnit… where did she go?" I muttered before feeling my body tug at me to go forward.

I followed the flow of where my body wanted to go until we finally stopped in front of a steel twin metal door. I didn't have much time to look at the door before my body was pushed into it making the door fling open.

I landed on the ground and I almost immediately sprang back up into action before feeling my wounds take hold of me again. No matter how much energy I thought I had, it wouldn't mean much if my legs were torn to bits.

"I'll admit… I'm slightly surprised to see you up and about… Kiritsu Kaizer." I heard her say as she closed the metal door that I had slammed open.

"How do you know who I am?" I asked her as I looked up with my hazy vision.

"Who DOESN'T know you… you're literally a legend." She commented, laughing to herself.

"What are you talking about? I'm no legend… I'm just a high school kid who just got into AT's a month ago."

"Oh… looks like you don't remember, do you?" She looked at me as if a little sad.

"I guess he hasn't told you anything… nothing about the incident two years ago, what you were… what you are… or what you shall become of you continue down your 'road'… such a sad existence you have right now…" She said as if she was honestly feeling sorry for me.

"What the hell are you talking about? What do you know about my accident two years ago?!" I yelled at her getting angry.

"Accident? Is that what he told you? It was an accident?!" She retorted with the same irritation.

"He goes and tells you it's an accident that you're in this state that you're in now?! Are you fucking kidding me?! That bastard!" She yelled as if she was pissed off at someone.

I didn't know what to think… this girl knew a lot more than she was letting on about and it was starting to piss me off. Everything about my incident two years ago has been a blur up until now and this is the first person who actually knows what happened to me.

I felt my energy within me spike as if it was in anger and I immediately jumped to my feet. I could feel the anger radiate from within me and at this rate I was going to lash out from how much it was over spilling.

"What… do you know…?" I asked her as I tried my best to fight back my anger.

She quickly reformed her composure at my question and looked at me with a keen eye. It was strange to see her change from how she was before. It was like she retracted back to a state where she could think properly and in one quick motion, she dashed past me and moved towards a console with several assorted buttons.

"I know a great deal about what you want to know Kiritsu… in fact, I know more about the incident than what your friend led you to believe." She said cryptically.

"Get to the point!" I shouted as I fell to one knee again.

"Patience… I could tell you exactly what you are and it would solve things quicker but it would just open up more questions that I would have to answer anyways with all of your nagging." She replied as she took a seat and motioned me to sit down in the other chair.

Grumbling to myself, I took the offer and sat down in the other chair. From what it sounded like, it would be a grand tale that would take a while to understand so I would need the rest for my legs. It was then that she began her tale.

"To figure out the easiest way to explain this, it would be best to just start from the beginning." She began as she soon started her story.

"Three years ago, talk of a rider had spread through the AT world. No one really knew where this rider had come from or who this person was… all they knew was that this person had an uncanny, almost god-like skill with AT's that made themselves a threat to the very foundation of the Parts War. His methods of execution rivaled that of the Fang King. His prowess of AT's and skills to mimic other riders had made this man one of the most formidable riders in all of the AT world."

"This man was later known as the Blood King. The reason for this name was the fact that no matter how badly he was beaten down, no matter how much blood he had lost or no matter how destroyed his body had become, he would continue to stand and to fight until his opponents laid down in defeat against his might. His energy was completely enveloped in crimson. His AT's were soaked in the blood of opponents and were constantly thrust into the battlefield."

"He was truly a fearsome opponent. So fearsome in fact that the other kings truly feared him. They were afraid of his power and how far he would go to reach the top. They were fearful of how far his methods would go to achieve his goals and they knew that he would be a threat to their reign if he was to get stronger."

"Fast forward to your incident two years ago… Nine of the ten kings had gathered to discuss the overthrow of the Tenth King… namely the Blood King. In one year alone, the Blood King had wrought destruction and carnage across the AT world… everyone knew his name and everyone knew of the sadistic methods that he would use to further his own ambitions. It was so sadistic in fact that the Fang King himself would be put to shame with his own methods."

"The Kings knew he had to be stopped. They knew that if he continued on this path, the AT world would shatter underneath his insane power. So, they came up with a plan… a truly evil plan that would solve all of their problems." She said as she looked down towards the floor.

"And… what plan was that?" I asked her, truly enthralled with the story.

"It's hard to explain… but if I could sum it up into one word… it would be to 'Seal' the Blood King's abilities. It was a plan to completely cut him off from his abilities to control AT's and to destroy his wings." She said as tears started to slightly swell up in her eyes.

"Well, they succeeded… with the help of the now-late Light King sacrificing his own abilities, they were able to seal up the Blood King and they completely shattered his wings. He was now stuck on the ground with no way to return to the sky. It was then that he declared something to the eight remaining kings. He said that he would one day return to the AT world with a vengeance like no other. He declared that he would change the way that the Parts War would be and that he would destroy the Trophaeum tower." She said as she looked up towards me as if staring into my soul.

I looked back at her with a blank expression. It was definitely a lot of information to take in but with every word that I followed, I felt that I knew the story to begin with. I just had to be told it again to fully remember exactly what had happened.

"As you've probably already connected the dots… I'll just say it right now." She finally said as she got up.

"_You… are the Blood King."_ She declared as she pointed her finger at me.

I was caught off guard by the statement. Sure, I did see it coming since it was such a dramatic way of explaining things but it was still hard for me to accept. I didn't know that there was such a side of me and pretty soon the questions started to pile up like bodies on a battlefield.

"W-Wait… wait wait wait…" I said shaking off the uneasiness. "I need to wrap my head around this…" I said trembling slightly.

"Take your time… it should be a lot to take in. In the meantime, I'll introduce myself and I will be here to answer your questions as they come up. My name is Zira Hattori." She said as she took a bow.

I didn't quite catch her name since I was still shaking off the feeling of being overwhelmed but that was quickly shaken up even more when she decided to gain my attention.

"Hey… you know, when someone introduces themselves… the person they are addressing should pay attention to them." She said as she moved in towards me and put her finger on my chin forcing my face to meet hers.

"There we go… much better." She commented before kissing me on the lips.

In no time at all, my face went completely flush with red and I immediately jolted back and slammed myself up against the wall.

"W-W-What the hell! What are you doing?!" I stuttered trying to regain my composure.

"What?" She said giggling. "I thought you would enjoy a kiss from a beautiful girl?" She said as she got closer again.

"That's not the point. You lay a bombshell on me, saying I'm the Blood King or whatever the hell that is… and then you confuse me even further by kissing me? Do you know how stretch thin my consciousness is? It's nerve wracking!" I yelled at her as I tried to calm myself down.

"Shhh shhh… it's okay…" She said as she put a finger on my lips to shut me up. "I understand completely Kiritsu."

We stood there for a good minute before my mind finally started to clear up. My mind was now working for me instead of against me and pretty soon the big picture that was laid before me had now become clear.

I was formerly known as the Blood King. My actions and my skills alone had completely destroyed the foundation of the Trophaeum tower and it had made me known as a threat to all in the AT world. Since I was such a threat, the other Kings had decided to deal with me by sacrificing one of their own to seal away my abilities… how this was possible, I will never know but it happened two years ago. It was the same time in which my friend and I had been doing parkour and the accident had happened which I have suffered until now.

There were a few questions that had to be answered for but overall I had now grasped the entire situation. With my head now level and my body on the verge of being healed, I broke the silence.

"Alright. I understand the situation… but like anything that has been told with a story, there are still some gaps… some gaps that I think you may be able to answer." I said as I took control of the situation.

"Alright. That's what I'm here for. Ask away." She said as she took a seat and motioned me to sit.

I once again to the seat across from her and started to bombard her with my questions.

"Okay. First: The incident that happened two years ago… you said that there were a total of 10 kings including me, the original 8 that I know about and an unknown 'Light King'. Who was the Light King?" I asked her as I awaited the answer that I already knew.

"Well… as I'm sure that you already know, it's the friend who told you what happened… or really what they wanted you to think actually happened." She said cryptically.

"I thought so." I said as my suspicions were cleared. "Alright, next: Who are you and why do you want to help me?" I asked as I started to connect the dots in my head.

"I wish to see the Blood King return to his former glory… and I wish to see his dream realized. I want to see the Trophaeum tower completely turned upside and be remade from scratch. I wish to see the destruction of the current order and to see something be born anew from the ashes of your wake." She said getting passionate about the idea.

"I see…" I said plainly as I moved on to my next question.

"How were my memories erased? Also, where is the Blood King's Regalia?" I asked in earnest as to what exactly happened to me.

"Well… that's the thing. I honestly don't know how they were able to change your memories or if it was just a product of the trauma you went through as you were betrayed by the Light King. Your feelings for your friend are truly genuine. You and him were such good friends but even he knew that you were too powerful for the good of the AT world. He was forced to cooperate with the other kings to ensure that the current world wouldn't fall into turmoil." She said as she explained the situation.

"As for your Regalia… you actually didn't have one. You were so powerful without it that you never required a Regalia to open up your potential. You were just that strong and that talented that you opened up the latent powers of your AT's and made your own road."

"But, my power that I had before was sealed up… are you saying that I'm going to revert back to my old self if I continue riding down the same path?" I asked a little scared of that outcome.

"No. Actually I'm pretty sure that you won't revert back to that same attitude that you had before your sealing… in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if you never return to 100% of your power but, that's why I'm here." She said with a smile.

"What do you mean?"

"What I mean is, my whole purpose in the AT world is to make AT parts. I am one of the founding members of 'Tool Toul To' and I wish to become your tuner." She said as she took a knee.

"It would honor me greatly… if you would allow me to create the Blood King's Regalia." She bowed down with a smile.

I was at a loss as to what to say. I didn't really know about the team 'Tool Toul To' nor did I know about what a Regalia grants the wearer. All Hiyu told me, or actually I guess he would now be known to me as the 'Light King', was that a Regalia unlocks the latent power of the user and amplifies it to an insane amount. It was the object that symbolized who was a King.

"Well, as much as I am honored to have a pretty girl such as you to help… erm… I guess the proper term would be to 'tune' me… I am still not experienced enough to take on the Kings like before… and I'm not even sure if I want to anymore. I've changed from that past and I think it's for the better that I steer from it." I said as I picked her up from her bowing stature.

"Sorry but… I'm just not the same person." I declared finally.

To my surprise she wasn't shocked at my determination… in fact I think she was hoping I was say something like that as if it were part of her plan.

"Are you so sure about that?" She asked me as she tugged on my shirt and flung me through the window that sent me into a large room with walls towering 15 feet up.

As soon as I landed I felt the searing pain from my wounds kick back in. I rolled across the ground and slammed up against the wall sprawled out on the ground.

"O-Ow…" I muttered before getting up to realize that my AT's were being thrown at me.

I dodged to the left and they landed against the wall. I looked back up to see Zira smiling with a sadistic look on her face.

"You say that you've changed. You say that you'll steer away from your path as the Blood King." She started as she started to laugh slightly. "Oh, how wrong you are little boy." She said as she pulled down a lever that triggered the opening of a door in one of the walls.

"What are you doing?!" I yelled at her in anger.

"Calling your bluff." She said as she looked over towards the opening in the wall. "I would highly suggest that you put your AT's on and begin to defend yourself… your probably have a good minute before they come here.

"Who's coming here?!" I yelled again in irritation.

"Your test." She said laughing hysterically.

No sooner did she say that did I hear the loud stomping of metal against tile. I could hear the screeching sounds of machine parts moving as it started to get closer and closer. In pure reaction I quickly put on the AT's powered them on before looking back up to notice that the mechanism had finally arrived and was just entering through the door.

Despite the noise it was making from the corridor that it came from, it wasn't a large machine. In fact, it was actually about the size of a human. It was roughly 6'2" with the shape of a humanoid body. It had the head of a human and the torso of a human. The arms were the same and the hands had four fingers instead of five. The only difference between it being an actual human and it being a robot were the feet that were wheels instead. Oh and the fact that it was made of some strange metal that definitely didn't look like steel.

"W-What the hell is this?!" I yelled as I saw it start to rev its wheels.

"Behold! Test bot #301! IGNIS!" She retorted as the wheels on the robot started to burst out flames.

**Hooray Chapter 8 completely finished. Sorry for the incomplete update before, hopefully you forgive me for it. Look forward to the next chapter as Kiritsu learns more about his latent and unknown powers. Oh and please R&R!**


	9. The Great Escape

_Kiritsu is trapped in a sadistic enclave. He is at the mercy of his captor and he has to dance around in her hand like a puppet. Will he be able to get out of this situation alive?_

"You've got to be kidding me!" I shouted as I dodged a flaming wheel to the face.

The battle with 'Test bot #301, Ignis' wasn't going too well. In fact, it was going so horribly that I was losing ground and it turned from a fight to a game of cat and mouse. Usually the metal of an object was rather easy for me to break since I had gotten better at wielding the power of my AT's but for some reason whenever I would come in close for a vital point strike, the robot would react and deflect the hit as if it were a true AI.

I quickly dashed in another time to swing my leg up towards its face. As to my expectations, Ignis reacted by rearing his head back and he brought his leg around and slammed it against my ribs. Since this was a robot and I was just a poor human, the robot had an overwhelmingly greater attack for due to its body of metal. I felt my ribs crack under the pressure and I was sent flying into the wall across the room.

My vision went back to that familiar blurry state. It was just like before when I fought the Fang King. I could feel my legs start to change and energy started to flow into them as if it were an injection shot of adrenaline. I could feel the power flowing through me as I saw that robot slowly make its way towards my location. I knew what I had to do, I knew what I would be able to do. I knew that if I let this energy go and sent it straight at this contraption, it would most surely be destroyed.

What was I waiting for though? What was holding me back from condemning this thing to eternal damnation? What was stopping me from ending this conflict and moving on to get out of this predicament? It was then I noticed what it was.

I looked down at my hand and noticed I was shaking. I wasn't shaking in anticipation that it usually was… It wasn't from the thrill of combat that I was shaking without me noticing. It was fear. I was truly afraid that if I let loose and let out that power, I would no longer be me. I would no longer be Kiritsu Kaizer, I would instead turn back into the Blood King and I would want to wrought destruction across the AT world again. That isn't what I wanted and I was subconsciously holding myself back so I wouldn't break that illusion of a dream.

"You're going to die if you continue to hold yourself back like that Kiritsu Kaizer." I heard Zira say over the speaker that was installed in the room.

"Yeah right. I wouldn't give you the satisfaction of it." I retorted as I jumped over the robot again to dodge another attack.

"It doesn't matter if you wouldn't want to or not. If you're fighting two battles at once, you're sure to lose." She said as she started to laugh. "You're so weak that you can't fight without your innate power. Unleash it and make this more interesting!" She yelled as she started to laugh again.

This sent me over the edge. I was being looked down upon and I was getting pushed back by a piece of metal. It was so degrading of my status as a storm rider that my pride got the better of me and I completely lost it.

Spinning around on my AT's, I dodged the incoming lunge of one of the bursts of flames and found myself situated on the inside of the robot's attack range. I was now within range to attack and it was probably going to be my only shot so I gave it my all.

I felt a surge of power going through my right leg. I felt the dark energy envelop me and it felt like I was tapping into a pool of energy. In one fluid moment, my leg went flying up into the upper torso of the robot and I caught a glimpse of what happened to my leg.

It was completely covered in black wisp-like energy. My AT's were literally glowing with a strong radiance of blood thirst and the air around the presence of my leg had become slightly distorted. As my AT connected with the torso of the robot, I felt the metal cave in. I didn't know if it was the metal on my AT or if it was Ignis but one thing was definitely confirmed: Something had been destroyed.

The next moment was a little hazy. The air around me seemed to have vacuumed itself out of existence and my vision had become blinded by the burst of light that originated from the impact of metal on metal. At one moment I was standing, the next thing I knew, I was against the wall as an imprint that had been slammed up against it by an enormous force.

I couldn't see and I couldn't hear anything. The sounds were muffled and whatever was in front of me was so indescribable that I honestly thought I had been drinking. I felt my body move but it wasn't from a self impulse or by a reaction to something, someone was pulling me and they were moving my body against my will.

It wasn't like I had a choice in the matter. Before I knew what was going on I had already felt the cool breeze of doors opening brush against my face and that was enough to tell me that I was being transported somewhere.

"…well… hold… better…" I heard only a few words from the voice next to me. Judging from the stature of the person as well as the voice that I could barely hear, it was most likely Zira that was trying to keep me sane and conscious.

Things proceeded slowly for awhile. I felt that the words that she was saying to me were helping but I wasn't able to make out anything. Every step forward felt aggravating and with every step my consciousness would shift from clear, to hazy, to blurry and would just continue degrading to a progressively worse state.

Eventually at some point I must've passed out since I soon found myself in a completely different place. The lights in the area were completely blotted out. There were no sounds that could be heard in a mile's radius and in front of me was a table with a lamp turned on as if you were in an interrogation chamber. This place was my Nirvana. It was my place of refuge to think about things and to set my mind straight. However, something was wrong with this visit. Something was off about me coming here at this moment in time.

It wasn't strange that I found myself here since I had been here before but I was honestly wondering how I was able to reach the confines of my mind when I had just narrowly avoided getting burnt to a crisp.

It was all made clear when a voice started speaking in my head.

"_What are you doing?"_ It asked me as I started to look around to find the source of the voice.

"I'm getting my assed kicked. What does it look like to you, you idiot?" I jeered at the unknown entity.

"_Well yes, I can see that… but you haven't answered my question. What are you doing?"_ It asked me again.

"I'm trying to figure out who I am." I replied as I thought about the question.

"_Why do you want to figure out who you are?" _It asked me as if trying to find a specific answer.

"Doesn't everyone wish to find out who they truly are? I'm just trying to find what I have lost."

"_You have lost much. Too much for you to retain and regain it all again. You will never again be able to go back to the way things were and I doubt you wish to become that which you were." _It said as if it read me like a book.

"You sound as if you know who I am and yet you don't show your face and you don't tell me who you are."

"_I thought it would be pretty simple since you're the one who made me." _It replied cryptically.

"I created you?"

"_Yes. Yes you did." _It replied as a light from above came down and showed where he was standing.

He was roughly 50 feet away from me with his back turned. He was wearing roughly the same clothes as me but his hair was different. Instead of it being as white as snow like mine, his hair was jet black that barely touched his collar. He wore the same AT's as me but something felt different about him. Something felt like this thing that I had 'made' was just a figment of my imagination but something else told me that he was something more than that.

"Who are you?" I asked him as he turned around to face me.

"_Is that supposed to be some sort of joke?" _He asked as if he was insulted by the question.

"No. It's not. You're an intruder in the confines of my mind. You say you're the by-product of my thoughts and that you know me pretty well. I want to know who you are and where you came from." I asked him as I got irritated.

He didn't say anything to me at that point. Instead of saying anything and answering my questions, he started to burst out laughing. He completely lost all of his composure and was truly enjoying my interrogation. I didn't know how to respond from that moment forward since it didn't seem like he was going to cooperate.

"What's supposed to be so funny?" I asked him, completely annoyed at his attitude.

"_Y-You… hahahaha!" _He continued to laugh. _"Y-Y-You have no idea... who you are and you've got no leads either. Oh this is too great."_ He continued as he started to calm himself down.

"_You heard from that one bitch that you were the Blood King and that your abilities were sealed, correct?"_ He asked me as he started to make me recall the events.

"Yes, that is correct but what does that have to do with you?"

"_Well… I guess I owe you that much since you have been getting the short end of the stick for the longest time."_ He said as he vanished from my sight.

It was then that I felt a presence leaning against my back.

"_I'm you, or to be more precise, I am your locked up ability." _He said plainly.

We stood there, back-to-back, for what seemed like a few good minutes. I felt that what he was saying was true but then again I didn't have much of a choice but to believe him.

"Then what are you doing here then?" I asked him as I stood there.

"_Waiting for you to wake up." _He said as he got off of my back and started to walk across the large room in my mind.

"Waiting for me to wake up? What does that even mean?" I asked him completely confused.

"_What? Do you have to spell it out for you? You're incomplete right now. You're in such a volatile state that it could completely screw up everything we have fought so hard to achieve."_ He said as if he was getting irritated at me.

"_You need to wake up. You need to wake up soon or else you're going to regret and lose everything that you have had to go through thus far."_ He said trying to warn me of the danger to come.

"But… how do I wake up?" I asked completely lost.

"_Like how you've done everything else… just ride." _He said before dissolving in front of me.

As soon as he disappeared from my sight, I felt a tremor hit the ground underneath me. I felt the walls around the confines of my mind start to shake and tremble from all the force that was echoing out from the source underneath me.

As soon as I looked down I noticed my feet had changed. My AT's were completely different than they were before. They had completely new jet black wheels with a jagged engraving designing the sides of the wheels. The metal plates on the AT's had changed color to a pure crimson red that looked like it had been drenched in the blood of its victims. On the heel of the AT's was a pair of cross swords with an English word etched at the bottom of the heel.

It wasn't long before my attention was distracted from awing at the sight of the new AT's when I heard the announcement come overhead.

"WARNING: The Muramasa has been activated. I repeat: The Muramasa has been activated. All available units secure the perimeter and commence protocol Zeta. Capture the intruder and shoot on sight. Intruder is male, 6 feet in height with a cross around his neck. Last seen in Block 5."

"W-What…?" I muttered as I looked around and noticed my vision become clear.

The surrounding area around me had been completely destroyed. The walls were cracked and crumbling, the floor had been depressed like a crater and the sprinklers overhead were fighting the fires that had erupted near the edges of my vision. The ceilings overhead looked like they would come caving in at any moment and I could've sworn I heard the heavy wheezing of someone who had just suffered a fatal wound.

Actually, now that I think about it, I did hear the wheezing of someone. I turned to face the source of the noise and noticed that Zira had been sitting down against a wall completely covered in wounds. She was breathing extremely haphazardly and looked as if she could be knocking at death's door any moment.

Staring at her destroyed body, I stood there in terror as I looked around to see what had done so much damage. I didn't see anyone in the area and it didn't look like I had suffered any real damage except from that fight with that flaming robot. Based off of those two facts, as well as the addition of getting some new AT's, I connected the dots and came to a conclusion.

I'm the one who did all of this.

I was interrupted in my train of thought when I heard the coughing sounds from Zira. She had just regained consciousness and was trying to tell me something. She motioned me over and like an obedient dog I followed the command and lent her my ear.

"Told you… you're still the same as you always were… Blood… King…" She muttered with the last of her strength. Her eyes completely closed and she lost all of the color that was on her face.

"There he is!" I heard someone shout as I looked over to see three troops in full body armor sprinting towards me.

I didn't have time to mourn over the loss of Zira. Sure, I didn't know her and she was a crazy person but it was a human life, a life that I had taken. I quickly dashed down the hallway behind me and made an immediate turn into a window that sent me out of the complex. I was roughly 30 feet up in the air and I was speeding through the air faster than I have ever done in my entire life. I wasn't sure if it was the need to get away from this area that I was going so fast or if it was the upgrade of my AT's that just made me that much faster. Either way I was booking it and before I knew it I was already halfway back home on the highway.

'Looks like I was able to get away…' I thought before instinctively dodging an arc of energy sent at my neck from below the highway.

"W-What the fuck?!" I yelled out as I noticed someone jump out from the shadows.

It was the same kid from before. It was the Fang King that had completely destroyed my arm and he looked pissed.

"God damnit it… why now?" I groaned as he landed 20 feet away from me.

"HEY! ASSHOLE! I still owe you from our last fight down in the alleyway!" He roared as he got ready to attack.

"Bow down and pray to your impudent god!" He yelled as he lunged towards me.

"You're too slow!" I yelled at him as I brought my foot up and struck out.

Usually, my kick would deal the regular damage that a usual AT kick would administer but with this new upgrade, the air at the end of my kicks seemed to explode as if the energy from my kicks would disrupt the flow of energy and make it volatile.

Using this to my advantage, I slammed my AT straight into his gut and sent him back down underneath the highway and watched as he fell. I knew he wouldn't die from the fall and I knew that he would be pissed the second he could get up so I wouldn't give him the chance to. As soon as I confirmed that he was good to go and ready to fight me again, I quickly dashed down the highway with all my might and left him in the dust.

'These things are amazing!' I thought before realizing I was being tailed by several other riders.

They didn't look like anyone I had seen before but they were definitely storm riders since they were able to keep up with me. I counted them out and realized that several other vehicles were following right behind them.

I spun myself around and jumped atop an 18-wheeler to get a good view of my adversaries.

"One, two, three four…" I started to count in my head until I finally reach 20 and stopped caring.

"Jeez, you guys must really want me huh?" I commented before turning myself around and dashing forward along the cargo box of the 18-wheeler.

I slid to a stop at the other edge of the large box on top of the vehicle before looking down at my AT's and bringing one of them up to see exactly what was engraved on the back of them. I had a pretty good idea of what the letters combined meant but what truly intrigued me was why they were going to such lengths to get it back. I mean after all, 'it was just a couple of AT parts… right?' I thought before looking back to realize that three of the riders were already up on the vehicle and headed straight at me.

"Give back what you have stolen!" The one closest to me yelled as he jumped at me and nearly grabbed my shirt.

I dodged narrowly to the side and watched him as he tried to balance himself near the edge of the vehicle where he landed.

"I haven't stolen… shit!" I yelled as I brought my leg around to the back of his head and watched as he flipped forward from the force and landed on the windshield of the truck.

Needless to say, the driver completely freaked out and in an instant, the truck started to veer off near the edge of the highway. Using this opportunity, I jumped off the top of the vehicle and landed atop one of the telephone towers. Following right behind me were the other two storm riders that were on the truck with me and following them were the 10+ riders who couldn't get close enough to the truck when they had the chance.

'Looks like I've overstayed my welcome…' I thought before realizing the presence of someone behind me.

It wasn't long before realizing this that I felt a major gust of wind fly by me and go straight after the men who were attacking me. Before I could realize what was going on, a familiar face landed next to me on the other side of the telephone tower.

It was Minami Ikki. What was he doing here?

"Well, I didn't expect this." I stated blatantly as Ikki looked back at me with a grin.

"Yo." He said plainly before directing his attention back at the group of attackers. "I thought I would step in and help since I was heading to a match and saw that you were being chased. Would you like my help?" He asked me as he kept a dead-locked look on the others.

"No. I don't need your help… but I don't think you'd just walk away even if I asked you to." I groaned before getting ready to fight.

He laughed whole-heartedly at the comment. "Yeah, you're right. It's not like me." He said before getting ready to fight as well.

As we were sitting there talking to each other, the other 10 riders that were following in tow had finally caught up and were stationed on the wires that were connecting the towers together. In total, we had 12 people in front of us and we only had the two of us to face against it.

"Give back what you stole!" I heard them say in unison like a bunch of drones.

"Hey, Ikki." I commented, completely ignoring the mass of retards.

"Yeah?"

"Want to play a game?" I asked.

"Sure. What type of game?" He asked completely enthralled by the idea.

"Let's see who can take out the most." I said with a devilish grin.

"Haha! I like this game." He retorted back with the same grin.

"Ready?" I started.

"Set." He replied, going along with the dramatic start.

"Go!" We both yelled as we started our assault against the attackers.

We cleared them out pretty easily with our combined skills. With a couple of key strikes and a lot of flashy moves up on top of the wires, all 12 of our attackers were sent running home with their tails between their legs.

"So, who won?" Ikki asked me as we both landed onto the highway to catch our breath.

"Hehe, you win. You did come to my rescue afterall." I said with a grin.

"Don't worry about it. It was a good warm up since I haven't been able to let loose in awhile." He replied as he looked off down the highway as if looking for someone.

"That reminds me… Why are you here at this time of night?" I asked him as we both regained eye contact with each other.

"Oh yeah, that's right. Buccha, Kazu, Onigiri and I are currently going in Sensei's car to go see a match. Did you want to go see?" He asked me as he extended his hand with the invitation.

"Sorry but I'm going to have to pass. I need to go talk to some people before tonight is over. Let me know how the match goes at school though." I replied as I started to leave.

"Will do." He said waving me goodbye.

I didn't get too far away until I heard his voice again.

"Oh wait, that's right!" he yelled trying to stop me one last time.

"What is it? I need to get going!" I yelled back, getting irritated at the prolonged discussion.

"Here!" he said as he threw a flash drive at me. "It's from Spitfire! He said that you would know what to do with it once you received it!" He yelled as he started to make his way back to his friends.

'From Spitfire huh?' I thought before looking down at it.

Looking down at the flash drive, I had one single thought coursing through my mind. This might hold some answers about my past.

It didn't take me long to connect the pieces together before finally making my way back home. I needed to think things through and I needed to figure out what happened to my AT's as soon as possible but; above all else I needed to talk to Hiyu and figure out what truly happened between us.

With a new resolve building up inside of me, I dashed my way down the highway and went straight home to mull things over.

**Woohoo!~ Chapter 9 down. Hope you forgive me for the late release. Had some problems with work and this was just sitting in my computer waiting to be posted so please forgive me! Hopefully things will start to wind down with work but I highly doubt it. Please be sure to check my profile for the descriptions of the characters I have made thus far. I will be updating them as I can and I will be adding in more to make things more interesting. As I am now on the subject of this, PLEASE if you want your own OC to make an appearance in my fanfic, please please pleeeeaaase let me know via PM or by review. I can't keep coming up with OC's since I'm starting to run out of ideas so if you could help me out with this, it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for all the support and please R&R. See you next time. :P**


	10. A Battle Under the Night Sky (Part 1)

_There are two lone riders staring at each other in a space. The space is not definable. It doesn't need to be definable; in fact they wouldn't have it any other way. They don't hate this relationship that they have. They welcome it gladly because they knew. They knew there was no other way around this. This was how it was to be._

"I have to ask you something." One of them says as I stare at the spectacle before me.

"You probably already know what I am going to ask and I already know the answer, but I still need to hear it from your mouth." He continued as he stared at the other person's eyes.

"Then ask away, I already know what you're trying to get at and it's just a waste of time to being with." The other replied as he stood there on the higher ground as if looking down at a lower primate.

"Why?" He asked plainly with a slight hint of pain in his voice. "Why did you do this? We could have had it all, you and I." He asked as he started to break down.

"You wanted to destroy the tower. I should be asking you the same question. Why did you betray our trust? Why did you betray everything that we have stood for until now?!" The one named Hiyu yelled back as he too started to sound like he was in pain.

"Me?" The other started to chuckle at the question. "You think I've betrayed everything that the tower has stood for?!" He roared back as he started to get angry at the accusation.

"Yes. That's exactly it. You've gone and destroyed the very foundation on which every storm rider has gone to achieve: To be something more than just a rider flying through the sky. To be more than just a rider that has to rely on wheels and tricks to truly be free!" He roared back as he too started to get angry at his oppressor.

"So, I will ask you again!" He concluded, as the one named Hiyu jumped off from his higher ground and started to descend towards his opponent. "Why! Why did you do it Blood King?!" He shouted out as he sent his fang towards his adversary with all of his might.

I couldn't see what the proclaimed "Blood King" said. All I could see were his lips moving before a white light engulfed the entire area. Before anything could be seen or heard, I found myself startled and awake at my desk with my computer on.

* * *

[Home, Kiritsu Kaizer's Room]

"Ah!" I jolted as I awoke from my slumber. "W-Wha… What was that?" I asked myself as I looked down at my trembling hand.

I quickly looked up and started to scan my eyes around the room to see if anyone was in the room with me. I knew I was just paranoid and felt some urge to talk to Hiyu about the dream I just saw but he was nowhere to be found. After scanning the room a couple more times I gave a reluctant sigh and looked back at my monitor that had been on for god knows how long.

I've never been much for having dreams. It's not like I hated them or had night terrors or any real problems with them, I've just never really had enough of them to get a real experience out of them. Ever since the "accident" two years ago, I've found that I have had less and less dreams. Sometimes I would see some images of past experiences and sometimes I would see myself acting as a super hero from a show that I saw a couple of days ago but this was the first time that I had such a comprehensive and detailed dream.

Something was wrong though. Something about that dream just didn't feel right. Was it just pure coincidence that as I learned the truth about my past that my mind would start to show me images of it? Could something like that even be possible? It would make more sense that my mind was just showing me images of what I wanted to see. Then again, that wasn't exactly true.

I wanted to see my friend as the cause of all the misfortune that I have gone through but at the same time I wanted to actually know the truth. I wanted to hear it from him and not just some figment of my imagination.

Getting up from my chair, I reached in my pocket and pulled out the flash drive.

"Maybe you'll have some answers." I spoke to it as I unlatched the lock on the device and pulled out the end to stick it into the computer. "Only one way to find out." I commented before sitting back down to attach the flash drive to the USB.

I quickly opened up the contents and scanned through the device. I noticed some lewd videos that Spitfire forgot to get rid of before sending me with this and as I rummaged through the files I finally found the one that he wanted me to see. It was rather obvious since of the 8 files that I found on the drive, only one of them was in all caps with the words "FOR KIRITSU"

'Well, that's Spitfire for you.' I thought before opening up the video file.

As the video loaded, I waited with anticipation as to what was going to be shown to me. It may have only taken about 10 seconds for the video to fully operate but it was such an excruciatingly painful 10 seconds that I started to feel anxious from just sitting in front of the screen. As the contents finally started to work, I listened and waited with baited breathe.

"Hello Kiritsu. Or rather, I guess I should call you the Blood King." The man commented before adjusting the camera to record his face. Not to my surprise, it was Spitfire.

"If you are watching this, it means that we have failed." He stated plainly before continuing. "It means that we were unsuccessful in sealing up your abilities and it means that you have once again become a threat to the Trophaeum Tower." He said as he took a deep sigh.

"Look. I'm going to level with you. You're too powerful of a rider for just one King to take on. In fact, I would even go as far as to say that you could handle on your own against two of the Kings if we decided to act against you but I'm warning you now, if you go on your quest again to take out the Tower, you will have to face all 8 of us. We are all of a sound mind now that you are a threat to everything we stand for and we will not allow you to do as you please." He commented as he stared at me through the monitor.

I got really irritated at his attitude. Who was he, to tell me what I could and couldn't do? Who was he to say what I was able to do and what I wasn't? That pompous attitude of being at the top and being able to do what you want, when you want had pissed me off so badly that I, for a moment, would go against my own intentions of not repeating my past self and just flat out do the opposite. I was so ticked off that I nearly punched him in face that was displayed on my monitor until he opened his mouth again.

"However…" He continued as I wreathed in my anger. "I personally do not wish to do anything to you." He said as he looked at me with his sharp red eyes. "I do not wish to fight against you and I don't think any of the other Kings wish for something like that either. Which is why, I am going to go against what the others have warned against and ask you in person." He stated blatantly.

"I want to know the truth from your own words, not someone else's fear." He said with a piercing gaze. "I want to know why. Why did you decide to do what you did? Why did you feel the need to go against the flow of everything we have done and everything we have achieved? Why did you go down the road that no one else could follow and why did you destroy the Light King?" he asked me with a truly honest and sincere impression.

"What type of question is that?" I replied, knowing that it wouldn't have any effect on the video. "I don't know man. How am I supposed to know when I don't even remember what happened?" I kept going as I started to feel my hand tremble again.

I was interrupted in my thoughts when I heard the video speak again.

"I will be over at the school at the highest point of the building. I will be waiting there tonight at exactly midnight. If you wish to see me, you now know where I am. I will be waiting for your reply… Blood King." He finished as the video stopped.

I sat there in silence for a good minute. I soaked in what had just been placed on my plate and I stared at it for a good long while. I knew what I had to do but it was the means on which that I would do it that would decide the outcome of the events to come. I knew that depending on my actions, depending my reactions to his questions and depending on what I would do in the future, would impact the entire AT world. There was still one question bouncing around in my head though. It was the wild card that I still wasn't able to figure out.

"Why did I start all of this?" I said aloud as I reclined in my chair and stared at the ceiling. "Why would my past self, go so far as to shake the foundation of this system and go against everyone?" I asked myself as I tried to do some really extensive thinking.

I knew from my own talk with my other self, in side of my head of course, that I was a seriously badass mother fucker with an innate ability to master riding. I was able to make my own road and I terrorized the AT world. I never once asked him if I killed anyone and it didn't seem like his composure was that of a killer so I could safely assume that I didn't have any blood on my hands (no pun intended.). It still didn't explain why I wanted to do all those things though.

Why did I want to destroy the Trophaem Tower? Why did I want to destroy the system? Was it because of a hate for the people who stood at the top? Was it because of the feeling of being restricted by a system? All of my thoughts and reasons seemed plausible but without another opinion or my memories I could never be sure.

Getting irritated with myself and all of my 'thinking' I quickly jumped up from my chair and felt it fall over into a wall.

"That's it!" I yelled as I picked up my AT's at the foot of my bed. "I'm going for a ride!"

Irritable.

That was probably the best adjective that described me at that time. I was so frustrated with my lack of knowing that I couldn't sit still any longer. I wanted to feel the freedom flowing in me again. It felt like I was addicted to a drug. I wanted to fly as far and as long as I wanted and I wanted to share this with everyone. I wanted everyone to feel what I was feeling and to not be afraid of any fights that would break out from the parts war.

'Wait a second.' I thought as I realized something. 'That makes sense doesn't it?' I continued to think, not worrying about my situation with landing. My mind quickly connected the dots together and I soon formulated a true and legit reason of why I would have wanted to do what I did in my past. I was interrupted however, when I heard someone calling my name.

"…zer! Kaizer! WATCH OUT!" I heard someone yell at me from below as I looked to see I was headed for a ledge of a house.

It was too late though. I had gained too much momentum and I didn't have enough time to extend my leg out to absorb the impact. With a resounding crash and a couple of sounds of what may have been broken ribs, I crashed against the ledge of the house and went tumbling into the balcony window.

"O-Ow…" I muttered before coughing up a little bit of blood. I felt the metallic taste of the crimson fluid fill my mouth and I swallowed it down so I could breathe. I knew straight from the pain I felt in my side that I knew I had just one rib broken.

"Ugh… C'mon, you've been through worse." I said to myself as I got up.

Luckily enough my legs were still perfectly intact. They didn't suffer much of any damage and I could still stand rather easily despite the pain in my side. I walked over to the broken window and stepped out onto the balcony to see who called my name and saved me from getting hurt even worse.

Turn out, it was Ikki and he was with someone. No idea who it was but it was someone who looked rather familiar since he had an orange long shirt on. Actually, now that I thought of it, it was someone who I knew all too well. The more I got closer to them, I noticed the features that started to stick out.

White eye patch, orange straight jacket, ropes hanging off of his legs… Yep it was the Fang King again but, something was different about him. He didn't have that menacing aura about him and he seemed rather calm around Ikki. As I got closer and closer I slowly, yet instinctively, got ready to dodge a fang from him.

"Ah! It's the fast rider!" I heard the fang king say as he pointed at me and laughed wholeheartedly.

"Ah? You know him Kiritsu?" Ikki asked me as we closed the distance between each other.

"Yeah… but, something's off about him." I said still playing defense.

"Oh, yea! You don't know like Ikki and Ringo and the others know." He replied.

"What don't I know?" I asked completely confused.

"I'm actually Akito. The one you have been having fun with is Agito. Agito says you're an annoying rider and that you should go hang yourself for your ine- inep- ineptitude but I think you're a funny person." He said with a cheerful smile.

'OOOoooookaaaay.' I thought as an anime-like sweat drop started to swell up on the back of my head.

This was probably one of the strangest "180" moments I had ever seen but for some reason Ikki didn't seem to mind.

"Oh, that reminds me. Did you see what Spitfire had on that flash drive? He asked me not to look at it no matter what so I didn't get to see what was on it." Ikki said as he pulled Akito away from me.

"Yeah, I looked on it and noticed that he forgot to delete a couple of awesome pornos. I gotta say he's got some good taste." I commented as Ikki got the most devilish expression appear on his face.

"Huehuehue… Kiritsu, my brother in arms… you know that you still owe me for saving you that night on the highway." He said trying to get his hands on the flash drive.

"Huehuehue… Ikki… I can't believe you would even try such a thing… do you want to die right here you little virgin?" I replied with the same devilish smile on my face.

"Hehehe… Do you really think me so low that I haven't seen my fair share? Oh how naive of you." He retorted back.

"A-ah… Uhm… guys?" Akito commented trying to stop the two titans from clashing.

We were interrupted in our "argument" when a large humvee pulled up and started shining its unnecessarily bright lights into our eyes. I couldn't see very well but judging from the presence and the lack of respect, this person wasn't here just to say hi. Before I could tell what was going on I felt someone brush right past me and started talking to Akito and Ikki.

"Oy… Agito. What do you think you're doing?" He said before cracking his whip on the ground.

I could hear Akito whimpering as he stayed behind Ikki to defend him. Was the great and powerful Fang King really afraid of an older man with a whip? It didn't seem like he was that strong and he didn't give off that intimidating of an aura but for some reason, Akito was actually scared of this person.

"O-Onii-san…" I heard him mutter as he cowered once again by the cracking of a whip against the pavement.

"You belong to me Agito. You're my pet. Now get in your cage and let's go home." He said as he turned around and waited for him to follow.

"Oy. Asshole." I heard Ikki say as he stopped Akito from leaving. "I don't know who you are, but I don't think that a brother or guardian would do such a thing." He said as he stepped in front of Akito to shield him.

"Yeah." I chimed in. "I don't really have any brothers or sisters but… I don't think that I'd be too fond of them if they cracked a whip at me for not going with their wishes." I said as I stepped closer to him.

"Don't get involved in matters you don't understand you little kid." He threatened me as he pulled out a Colt .45.

What the hell. This guy has a humvee that he just strolls around in like it's no one's business. He has a whip that he cracks around on the ground like he's the master of a bunch of slaves and to top it off he has a Colt .45 on him and he whips it out like it isn't a problem. Needless to say, this guy was a bonafide badass. We stood there for a few seconds before Akito decided to chime in like an idiot.

"A-Ah… Um… Onii-san?" He looked at Ikki and gave a gratifying nod. "I-It's okay… I need to take care of some things anyways so… I'll be going home with my brother." He said as he made his way over to the man's side.

Just like that, Akito went and got into the humvee. Nothing much we could've done at that point. I mean, we could've started some drama and actually gone against both of their wishes but I doubt it would've achieved much. Seeing as how we were being pointed at with a gun, it was a little reassuring to know that Akito willingly went back with him… or did he?

"Hey. Are you alright with this?" I asked Ikki as he stood there watching the humvee drive off.

"Yeah. Don't worry about me. I'll be taking care of this matter in my own way." He said as that same and familiar devilish smile appeared on his face.

"Well, if you say it's fine then I won't bother. Sorry to end things short here but I have to take care of a couple of things on my own." I said as I started to walk past him. "See you at the top." I said as I passed by him and we bumped our fists together.

'Now to take care of this matter with Spitfire.' I thought before dashing forward on my AT's towards the school.

* * *

[Higashi Junior High]

As usual, it was a rather desolate place. No one could be seen on the campus grounds and if it wasn't for the earlier renovations, I probably would've seen some tumbleweed passing through the courtyard. Either way, I wasn't here to talk to a bunch of people or to hang out with friends. I was here to figure out the past and to finally put it behind me so I could push ahead. I wanted to get things straightened out and I was started to get pissed off about the whole idea of being unknown to my memories.

As I rolled on up to the middle of the campus I started to look up and around for the highest point in the school. It was actually not that hard to figure out what was the tallest point in the school but it was the fact that it was hard as hell to get to it. Now sure, I was a pretty good rider and I could jump up rather high but I never was able to get as high as the school's main tower, which happened to be the tallest point in the school. With it towering over the entire campus at an incredible height of 135 feet and the other point that is even notably comparable to it being a simple 65 feet. So, that left a good 70 feet in between the two which was definitely too far of a distance for me to travel without any assistance.

Contemplating my options, I stood there for a good few seconds in a thinking pose before my thought process was interrupted by a presence that decided to show itself.

"Looks like you really did show up huh… Blood King?" A familiar voice said before I turned around to face him.

Lo and behold, it was Hiyu. Hiyu had decided to come and see me over at the school which could only mean one thing. I was set up by the Flame King and that this wasn't just a meeting. It was an ambush.

"Well, you sure have some nerve but, I have to hand it to you. I didn't expect you to come see me." I said trying to stall for time.

"I knew things couldn't stay the way things were right now. I had to settle things with you, here and now." He replied as he took a few steps towards me.

"For once… I think we agree with each other about something." I said as I too took a couple of steps towards him.

"This is where all this madness is going to end, Kiritsu."

"Or, this is where it will all being, Hiyu."

Staring at each other under the moon that was just piercing through the clouds, we both stood there awaiting to clash with our wills. This wasn't going to end well. We both knew that. We both knew that this was going to be the end of our relationship and we could do nothing but be played by the hands of fate.

The time was now and my anger was starting to boil. Lashing out with all of my strength I took the first move and we started our fight underneath the night sky.

**And with that, the climactic battle begins! Please be sure to answer the poll, your votes will definitely play a part in the impact of how things will go and what I will be doing with this fanfic. Thanks again for all the assistance and please be sure to R&R! :D**

**P.S.**

**This will be the final time I will be asking for OC's for a long time. Let me know if you want to have me add in any OC's that you guys can think up of. Either put it in a review or just PM me and I will see what I can do. Take care and stay frosty.**


	11. A Battle Under the Night Sky (Part 2)

_The climatic battle begins between two friends. They are friends who have known each other for so long that they could even consider themselves brothers. Played by the hands of fate, they fight under the moonlit night sky._

I've never been much for words. I'm always in the corner, always listening, always watching. I'm never one to be seen or to be heard and I like it this way. I like it so much in fact that it had become a part of my life. It's what I did, it is what I will always do, and it is what I will continue to do until it no longer proves to be useful to me.

Then again, that can't exactly be true, can it? I mean in all reality, I'm as much of a person as the one standing in front of me. I have hair, I have eyes, I have a mouth, a nose, two legs, two arms, anything that can be generalized in such a way that it defines a human. Yes, I am the exact same thing as him. I am a human.

However, there is something that he has that I lack. He has something that makes him better than me in every way. He stands above me in the echelon of the food chain and it is only because of one simple fact that he has placed himself above me.

"What is this thing?" you may ask. Well, it's nothing complex or complicated like a genetic imprint. It was never something so complicated as that. It was so simple in fact that it could be placed into one sentence and everyone reading it on a piece of paper could easily understand and take it to heart.

'_**He has his memory, and I don't.'**_

It's a rather simple variable. It's so simple to misread and overlook but it's just enough to put you ahead of someone. This is what Hiyu had above me. This is what was going to make him such a threat and it was going to make him a force to be reckoned with.

Thinking to myself about how to combat my friend, I lunged forward at him with my knee and he easily blocked it with his right hand. Realizing that I was completely open to assault, he quickly took advantage of this and swung himself around, using my knee as a fulcrum, and brought his AT's into my jaw. I was sent instantly spiraling through the air and I slammed into a pole of one of the lamp posts in the courtyard.

Recovering from the impact, I looked towards where Hiyu was and noticed that he was no longer within my sight. I knew that he was a fast rider but I didn't know he was so stealth-like either. If I didn't have a good enough grasp on my senses and a good idea of what he would do next, I wouldn't have noticed the swing of his leg as he appeared behind me.

Ducking below his leg, by leaning forward, I used my momentum and spun myself around on the ground with my leg fully extended and tried to trip him. To my utter surprise he jumped over it with only one AT on the ground and he once again turned himself around into a spiral while in midair and cracked me in the jaw. Yet again, I was sent airborne into a wooden bench and my body broke it upon impact. I coughed up some blood and noticed that my hands were shaking from all of the adrenaline pumping through my body.

I returned my gaze toward Hiyu and noticed that he hadn't moved from where he was last standing. It seemed strange to me that he didn't continue his assault. It wasn't like him to take his foot off the throat of his enemy when he had them where he wanted them. It was like that with every video game; every philosophy of his, every fiber of his being was that of a beast that would be relentless until his adversary was nothing more than dust on the ground, drenched in pools of their own blood.

I then understood why he was just standing there. It was an after-image. It was just a figment of the light rays that enveloped my vision and in an instant, the illusion vanished and Hiyu was nowhere to be seen. I wondered exactly why he was playing such dirty tricks but it didn't matter at that point. Anything went in this fight and if he wanted to play stealth then I would just have to play along and find him.

Standing there amongst the wreckage of the bench I destroyed, I placed my AT's on two of the boards and started to rev them up. I kept myself there for a couple of seconds until I started to smell the smoke start to form up from the embers that were being created by the friction. As soon as the smell of the embers reached my nose I stomped down upon the boards with all of my might and they instantly shattered into saw dust and wood chips that quickly fired out in all directions.

I suffered a little bit of damage to my legs but because I was wearing some jeans, I came out of the mini explosion with just a few cuts. Hiyu on the other hand quickly yelled out in anguish as several shards of woodchips had entered into his torso and legs. It was nothing serious nor could it be called anything close to fatal but it surely would've hurt if it was enough to make him voice his concern about it.

"Enough of the Hide-and-go-Seek games." I said as I revved up my AT's again.

The air around me started to pick up with speed. With speed came wind, which soon changed to gales and soon they were torrents that quickly enveloped the surrounding area. I readied myself to begin my assault before I realized the presence of several riders in the area. I didn't really care who they were but if they were to interfere, it would serve to trouble me further in trying to get to the bottom of the mystery behind my past.

Dismissing the continued presence around us increasing in size, I quickly dashed forwards and brought my knee to his face. It was a lot stronger than my last attack and it would have surely broken his nose in if he hadn't brought his hands up and backed up a bit to lessen the blow. My aggression didn't stop there though, I quickly brought myself around while he was blocking my right knee and I swung myself to his outside and brought my AT to the side of his face.

Instantaneously, he went with the flow of my kick and was sent into an uncontrollable spin in the air that landed him into the fountain at the center. With a resounding splash and a soft landing of AT's against the tile in the courtyard, I stood there waiting for him to get up. I knew that wouldn't have been the end of that fight. I wasn't nearly as satisfied with the results thus far and I knew that he wasn't either. Living up to my expectations, as he always has, Hiyu quickly got up from the river, completely drenched head to toe with a really pissed off look in his eye.

"This…" He began. "This… is my favorite shirt." He said as he started to tremble. "You ruined… my favorite shirt." He continued as he looked down to see the damage to his outfit.

"Well, you shouldn't have put on something you enjoyed to wear to a fight." I said, countering his statement with logic.

He didn't look too pleased with my response and he kindly replied to it in kind by sending a fang at me. Usually, I would dodge it and move out of the way to set up for another attack but for some reason I felt like I had seen that fang somewhere before. It was a brilliantly shining fang that pierced through the vision of my pupils with a radiant light. Instinctively moving my foot up, I brought my AT up and forward to block it. I knew that this was going to be a powerful burst of energy but I had no idea what was in store the second my AT impacted against the fang.

As soon as the two entities collided, I felt the immense pressure and power behind the force of his fang. Usually when confronted with a fang, it would immediately dissipate the second it hit and did its damage but for some reason this arc of pure energy was continuing to assault me even after the initial impact. It was almost as if the energy from his AT's had come to life and it was attacking me. I felt my leg start to give and my balance was slowly starting to wane. Before I could bend the arc of energy away from me, I looked above and noticed Hiyu was right above me about fifteen feet into the air.

"EAT IT!" He yelled out as he sent another fang at me from above. I had no way to dodge or block it this time so I was forced to brace for it.

As the yellow arc hit me from above, I felt the ground quake beneath me. The force from his fang was so strong that it cracked the very foundation of the courtyard and everywhere within 50 feet of us started to shake and crumble. In a blinding flash of light, everything was obscured to me. I was oblivious to anything around me. I couldn't sense anything near me. The ground beneath my feet was non-existent, the presence of a human was forever lost to me and my vision was clouded by a sheet of white.

Before I knew what damage had taken its toll on me, I finally noticed something come into view. It was a white and black AT with its wheels directly over my face. It was Hiyu's AT, and I finally realized what was about to happen. He was going to finish me off.

'No. Not like this.' I thought to myself as I noticed his AT get farther away from me as they hovered above me like angels of death.

'Not like this. I can't go down here, not now.' I begged my body again as I felt powerless to stop the finishing blow.

There had to be something I could do. Something I could achieve in this life that meant something. I wasn't about to let my friend end it. I couldn't let him end it. Not like this anyways. I had to stop him. I had to let him know my plan. I had to let him know why I did what I did and what it was meant to be. It wasn't supposed to be like this!

"Power…" I muttered to myself as the guillotine descended upon me. "Power… give me more… power!" I yelled to myself as I felt the wheels carved into my flesh.

"**Hey, I have to ask you something, Kiritsu Kaizer." **I heard him say in the dark. **"Why do you ride? What do you want to gain out of getting more power?" **He asked me as a single showcase light illuminated his position across the room. It was that same person that I had encountered before. It was the 'Alternate me' so to speak.

"I… I want to destroy this system." I replied to him as I searched myself for the answer. "I don't want to be governed by the 'Trophaeum Tower' I just want to be able to ride as free and as fast as I can. I don't want the title of a king; I don't want the power to rule over someone or the responsibilities to govern over other riders." I couldn't believe what I was saying. I couldn't even fathom what was coming out of my mouth but with every hanging word that escaped my lips, it was all the truth.

"I…" I stopped myself as I tried to muster up the strength to voice my ultimatum. "I want to fly." I said finally as he started to clap.

"**Looks like I wasn't wrong. We're still the same as we've always been, even if you are a little less sadistic than me."** He replied at my response with a smile. **"I can rest easy now, knowing that I can entrust you to do what we intended to do." **He finally said as he started to disintegrate into the dark abyss.

I stood there awkwardly for a few seconds. I didn't know what happened but apparently I did well. I think? Before I could question my sanity on exactly what had just transpired, I was blinded once again except this time, instead of it being a white sheet covering my vision, I was enveloped in a dark and tainted grasp that could only be conceived as receiving the power of a devil. I felt the energy surge through me body and I noticed myself start to shake. I could feel my strength returned ten-fold and my vision started to return to its original state when Hiyu had brought his ATs down to finish me.

I realized at that time that something had stopped his ATs from making contact with my face. It was a hand. A hand had interfered and shielded my face from the attack and it was a hand that was now bleeding a crimson fluid. It took me a few moments to connect the pieces together but I finally realized what had happened. My body had instinctively shielded itself and my hand had now been ripped to shreds by the ATs instead of my face. It was a strange sight to understand at first but for some reason or another, my hand wasn't hurting. It might have been numb or the adrenaline might have just turned off my nerves to not feel the pain but regardless, I was holding my own while lying on the ground.

"I-Impossible." I heard Hiyu mutter as I shoved his AT from me making him fall backwards from his lack of balance.

I slowly rose up from my grave in the ground. I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins. I was witnessing my senses becoming more acute. My vision had sharpened, my hearing had gotten clearer, my reaction speed had quickened beyond anything understandable and my strength had skyrocketed past any comprehension. I could feel something within me start to grow. I could feel myself losing my sanity to this overwhelming power and it was then that I realized something that could only be explained as an epiphany. I had finally taken off the shackles that were holding me back. I had finally returned to my former strength.

I looked down at my hand and clenched it tight. I could feel the crimson liquid seep out of my wound and it started dripping onto the ground. I looked up towards Hiyu and strangely enough, he didn't seem scared. Then again, why would he be? There's nothing I would do to actually hurt him, at least not fatally. Why would I ever even think of that? Why do I even keep thinking about this situation? There's no way I would hurt him. Would I?

"Looks like… it's finally started to come off." I heard someone say in the shadows.

Immediately following the comment, I felt a presence move past me at an incredibly fast speed. Behind his wake was a trail of fire that stopped right next to Hiyu and in a brilliant display of flames and embers, Spitfire appeared.

"What are you doing here Spitfire?" Hiyu said as he gave him a glare.

"You know as much as I that you've lost this fight." He replied calmly.

"I can still fight against him. I can still stop this." Hiyu retorted as he revved up ATs again.

"Do you really think you can beat him as you are now with no regalia? Especially since he's completely shattered what was left of your regalia." He commented as he finally made eye contact with me.

"I don't need your help Spitfire, stay out of my way. This is my fight."

"It became my fight the second his hair color started to change." Spitfire commented as he started to rev up his ATs.

"So, it's two against one? Isn't that a little unfair?" I shrugged my shoulders as I too started to rev up my ATs.

Spitfire didn't respond to me, instead he went right back to his conversation with Hiyu and whispered something in his ear. Before I could ask what all the secrecy was about, Hiyu jolted up as if in complete shock and looked at Spitfire as if he'd seen a ghost.

"H-He… he's going to be coming here?" Hiyu asked as he looked like he had just witnessed a revelation.

"I asked for back-up. We might need it." Spitfire replied as if it was nothing.

My patience was wearing thin. Spitfire was supposed to meet me here to begin with and he set me up to fight against Hiyu. He now is going to fight against me in a 2vs1 and now he's saying stuff about back-up? It was one sure-fire way to piss me off and it was time for me to show them that I wasn't to be ignored.

Reacting to his final comment, I brought my leg up and shot out a fang that nearly impacted against them from just how fast it was sent out. They both were able to dodge easily enough but as soon as they landed the both stopped their conversation and glared over at me.

"Don't… ignore me." I threatened them as I slowly retracted my foot to the ground.

"It looks like you really have lost yourself, Kiritsu Kaizer." Spitfire commented.

"No. I haven't lost myself. I've just finally gotten free of the shackles that the person next to you apparently put on me." I replied as I got ready to strike again.

I revved up my ATs once again before I sensed another presence lunging at me from behind. I knew that it was a smaller presence so I rapidly stomped my heels on the ground and shot up a several rocks behind me which implanted themselves into the attacking party behind me. I then quickly jumped up and backwards over the perpetrator and noticed the ropes. It was strange though since instead of them being the regular orange color, they were black. Regardless, I easily dodged the Fang King's attack and I landed gracefully about 15 feet back from where I was before.

Looking down the paved and yet slightly destroyed road, I was now staring down a total of three opponents. Really, there were three opponents against one person who had just finally awakened to his full potential. Needless to say, it wasn't going to be an easy fight. Then again, it's not like I had much of a choice. Sighing to myself in a depressing way, I did what anyone else would do. I started to ride. I didn't know where I would go or where I would be safe but, I knew that if I kept on riding, I would find the answer to this predicament.

"OY! Get back here you little shit fucking fuck!" I heard the fang king yell as he trailed behind me.

I quickly jumped up on one of the walls and start to wall grind my way towards the edge of the building until I jumped once again onto a taller tree branch which then had me jumping to the top of one of the roofs of the building. I knew he would be trailing right behind me so as I landed on top of the roof, I spun myself around and brought my leg out which instantly connected to his face. He went spiraling out of control from the colossal blow to the jaw and he was sent straight back down towards the ground.

I didn't have much time to rest though since Hiyu was trailing right behind him and he had already leapt at me with a terrifying speed. I narrowly ducked under his attack by bending myself backwards as if I was playing limbo and I quickly recovered myself only to be hit in the chest by Spitfire's ATs. It was rather strange though since the second he impacted his ATs against me, he balanced himself on top of my chest like a trapeze with one AT and he initiated his assault to my face the other. He got in a good three strikes before I finally grabbed his AT with both of my hands and I started to twist his ankle until he slipped out of my grasp and started to skid down the side of the building.

"Tch." I groaned as I noticed Hiyu had already gotten behind me and was sending a horizontal fang towards my way. In reaction to this, I bent myself around and sent my own vertical fang back at his completely cutting it in half. It didn't stop there though, I quickly spun myself back around again and using both of my ATs, I jumped into the air and sent two separate fangs with my ATs while rotating in midair.

I didn't get to see what had happened to Hiyu after that since I had fallen off of the building from how far off I had jumped but it didn't matter. I was now falling down with nothing in the area to latch onto. Sure, I could use a fang to push me towards the wall of a building and start grinding down it but I knew that the Fang King would attack me soon, so I waited there, perpetually falling.

"You FUCKER!" I heard the Fang King roar as he grinded up the wall and leapt towards me with his ropes.

'Right on cue.' I thought before extending my leg out and purposefully latching it onto two of the hooks. I didn't let the hooks penetrate my skin but I had just enough traction to use the hooks as a fulcrum to bend myself around the Fang King to avoid his initial lunge. It was then that the Fang King did something unexpected. Instead of his usual flying forward, he bent his spin back and brought himself into a backwards spin that brought his AT right down onto my skull. I had no time to dodge and before I knew what was up and what was down, I was in the ground with an imprint and a crater to call a home.

"O-Ow…" I grumbled to myself before I noticed a large arc of flame start to spiral above me.

"Really Spitfire? Give me a break already!" I roared out before busting out of my grave and back flipping to safety from the pillar of flame that soon engulfed the area.

"I go by the motto of not letting your foot off your opponent's neck when you get them in that position." Spitfire said with what I could've sworn would be a smirk on his stone-like expression.

"Don't you think it's about time you got serious?" Spitfire asked me with a glare. "It's hard to fight you if you're not going all out like back then. I can't be sure if you're just playing with me or if you've something up your sleeve and it's getting rather bothersome." He explained as he stood there with his hands in the pockets of his large coat.

'Wait, you're telling me that I was stronger than this?' I thought to myself as I took up a stance that felt the most comfortable.

"Yes. You were that strong way back when." Spitfire commented as if reading my mind.

"H-How did you-?"

"Your face says it all. Your heart is sporadic. Your breathing is unnatural and you have the look of a beast that just awoken." He explained as he observed my reactions with a keen eye.

"To sum things up: You're not at 100% yet. Sure, you've unlatched the Light Regalia from your innards and you've finally unlocked your potential but that's all it is, potential. If you don't quickly master it and return to your true self, you're going to be continually hunted down by the Kings." Spitfire said with a concerning eye.

"Why are you telling me all of this? You said it yourself, I'm a threat." I asked him with bewilderment.

"Correction: You're not the same person that I fought long ago. You've changed somehow. I don't know what it is but, you're not the same Kiritsu Kaizer that nearly destroyed everything we kings stood for back then." He clarified.

"However, I still can't trust that you've changed. I'll just let you know this now, while we still have a few seconds to chat: You need to make your own choice on how you want to use that power of yours. Be the person you want to be and I will observe you from afar. If you truly turn back down that path of destruction, I will be there to stop you as well as the other Kings who will soon arrive to handle this… state of affairs." Spitfire elaborated before a glare of caution disrupted his focus.

He quickly looked up and out towards the distance as if staring at something or someone that was coming towards him. As soon as he made eye-contact with me again, I heard him mutter something but I couldn't quite make it out. As soon as he finished muttering whatever he was saying, he quickly jumped back and started to wall grind backwards up until he reached a balcony about 20 feet up.

"Why did you run away Spitfire?" An unknown female entity said as she landed in front of me with a gale force of winds following straight behind her.

She had long magenta hair that was neatly braided with a yellow ribbon holding it all together. She wore a black shirt with an angel wings design on her shoulder blades. Around her waist she wore a skirt that reached down towards the top of her knees. Her ATs were of an odd design. They rode up on her legs like a pair of cowgirl boots and they stopped around the middle of her shins. They were a dark navy blue in color and they had intricate designs that decorated the leather that was surround her legs. The ATs themselves were blue and white in color with cracked shatter marks that looked like they were made of ice. To top it all off, the skin that was showing was so fair that it looked like a doll's skin and she had C-cup breasts. She looked like she was around 18 years old and in pure honesty; I would even go as far as to say she was a little bit beyond perfect.

"Didn't expect to see you here of all places, Black Panther." Spitfire said with a slight anxiousness in his voice.

"And I didn't expect to see you harassing someone with your skills in a 3v1." The proclaimed 'Black Panther' responded.

"You of all people should know exactly why we have to act like this. Especially since your connections with this one are… well let's just leave it at that." He said cryptically.

"It doesn't matter who he is. This isn't an official match and you're not acting like a King should act." She retorted with an aura of killing intent. "If you must insist on continuing this nonsense, I will personally make it my objective to make your life a living nightmare." She continued as I could see her revving her ATs up.

"Well, as much as I would love to indulge you in a dance, I will have to decline. We've stayed here too long and have attracted too much attention." Spitfire said as both Hiyu and Agito landed on the balcony.

"So this is where you were you little spit fuck!" Agito roared with a devilish grin on his face. "Damn you to hell Spitfire with your Flames! You hid your presence with him inside!" Agito yelled at the red haired man with agitation.

"If I had let you continue to fight him, I wouldn't have been able to achieve my goal here. You'll forgive me, won't you?" The flame king replied with a smirk.

"Fuck you, you gay little shit! This little fucker is mine. He will become a part of my road and I'm not about to let a little fucker like you get in my way!" Agito retorted getting even more pissed than he was before with each word that escaped his lips.

"If you continue to fight like this, the riders that are watching this "Battle" are going to start to get suspicious. It's already bad as it is with four- apologies, five kings all duking it out in the same area." Hiyu said calmly with a refined pose.

Agito quickly shut his trap and looked about to finally notice that everyone who had gathered were looking intently on what was going to happen next. I don't know if it was his other side that took control or if Agito finally snapped to his senses but he quickly refined himself and started to speak as calmly as his patience would allow.

"Tch, Fine! I don't give a fuck anymore! You take the fun out of everything you fuckers." Agito groaned before dashed off of the balcony and landing on a higher platform just above us. "I'm going home. Don't let me catch you again out alone you little fuck!" He yelled before dashing out of sight. We were all standing there for a few more moments before Spitfire spoke up.

"Well then, I guess it should be time for us to be getting out of here as well, right Hiyu?" He asked him as they both stood there on the balcony.

Hiyu didn't respond immediately to him. I don't know what was going on through his head but something was piercing through his mind and he wanted to say something badly to me. He wanted me to know the thoughts that were on his mind. He and I both knew that this wasn't going to be over here and he wanted to continue it until it was finished. With a longer silence perpetually spiraling through the area, Hiyu finally gave a sigh and revved up his ATs. I braced to see what he would do but as I did, he quickly vanished like a flash of light and he was no longer anywhere to be seen.

"Well then, there you have it." Spitfire commented before revving his ATs. "We will be meeting again soon Kiritsu Kaizer. I hope that we can actually talk like civilized people instead of dealing with situations like this." He said before jumping up and vanishing in a fiery blast.

I let out a deep sigh as soon as I felt his presence dissipate. I wasn't scared of him nor was I not happy on how things turned out. It was probably the best thing that could have happened in this situation and it would have only gotten worse if it were to continue. We all knew that things wouldn't keep quiet if we continued to fight with this many riders around and it would be bad for me to stay here any longer since some riders would more than likely come up to me and ask me what that was all about.

I was completely caught off guard and my focus was completely shattered when I felt the kiss of lips on my own. Apparently, while I was deep in thought about what had transpired, the one who was proclaimed as the "Black Panther" had decided to stroll on up into my personal space and land a whallop of a smacker on my lips. Granted, I couldn't have been happier to receive a kiss from someone who was so beautiful but at the same time it was the most random thing to have occurred this night. Completely caught in bliss and ignorance, I instinctively jolted back and dashed myself backwards about a good 15-20 feet.

"W-What the hell?!" I yelled at the girl who committed the same lustful act as a certain someone that I once knew.

"What? I thought you would have enjoyed receiving a kiss." She replied with a slight giggle. 'It's the same response…' I thought before clearing my head again.

"That still doesn't explain things though, not any normal person would just up and kiss another without a good reason. What's yours?" I asked her as if I was actually offended by the act of her kissing me.

As soon as I finished asking my question to her, she sped up and got in real close to me as if observing my face. She then quickly rotated herself around and started to circle me as if inspecting me and then came to a dead halt in front of me, no more than 5 inches away from my face with her arms placed upon my shoulders.

"Well, if I had to put my mind on it, I would say that I've fallen for you." She said as she started to blush a little. "My name is Tadashi Miyuri. It's a pleasure to meet you again." She said as she placed her hands on my cheeks.

**And there we go. Hope you forgive me for the late release, I had to change some things around and modify a couple of errors that will most likely still be abundant in the chapter. Hope you like my implementation of one of the OC's and soon I will be adding in a multitude of others. As before, I will still be accepting OC's but I will have to stop soon enough since I have to at least tie them all in together with the storyline. I was asked earlier about what the criteria I would need in order to add in your OC so please look at my profile to see the criteria. Thanks again and please R&R!**


	12. The Shinsengumi Debut

A fight with three kings, a best friend who doesn't say what's on his mind and a beautiful girl who just happens to have a crush on you. What could possibly go wrong?

Everything.

Everything is going wrong. From left to right, up to down, east to west and from every corner of the Earth, EVERYTHING is just going wrong. Why you ask? Well it's the fact that I had no idea that the fight with the Flame King, Fang King and (ex)Light King would spread this fast over the internet in such a short time. In no time at all, everyone at class knew about it. Sure, no one knew any names since it was hard for them to see what exactly was going on but it was enough to arouse suspicion.

Oh, and did I also mention that the one girl from earlier that kissed me left another surprise for me when I woke up this morning? Yeah. Just swell.

[A few hours earlier that day]

Black is probably my favorite color. I don't really know why, but it's just a soothing color. It's the color that you see when you're asleep, it's the color that you see when it gets dark out and it's the color that you see in most movies where the bad ass in the movie is wearing that color the most. To sum it all up: Black is a bad ass color.

It just so happens that right now all I am seeing is black and I gotta say, it's not that bad since it's just a byproduct of me sleeping. Oh, how wrong I was going to be in the next couple of seconds.

As I stirred from my slumber, I couldn't help but notice that I was a lot warmer than usual. I didn't know why since I had a fan buzzing in my face to feel like I was moving through the sky. (It's a little odd, I know but, it doesn't mean that I don't like it.) Either way, I felt really hot around my torso and it also felt a little bit more constricting that usual, almost as if it wasn't just the sheets and the comforter holding me in place in my bed.

As soon as I tried to get up and away from my bed, I felt a tug on my torso, as if someone was holding onto me with their arms, completely holding me against my will. I tried once again, this time more forcefully, to get out of bed and I felt the grip loosen and I was sent tumbling out of my bed by the sudden outburst of momentum. As I hit the ground and turned around to see what had held me in place I could only hang my mouth ajar as my suspicions came to fruition. As it turned out, it was someone holding me to my bed.

On my bed, lying completely naked except for a pair of panties to hide her… well yea… that part, was Miyuri.

Granted, I have never slept with ANYONE in my entire life so far and I couldn't fathom how the experience would have been if I had known that I was sleeping with someone but regardless, I could do nothing except hang my jaw completely open, almost hitting the ground where I was sitting. It was truly a masterpiece to behold: She was partially covered up by the white sheets that were a mess by me tumbling out of the bed. Her skin was as beautiful, if not more so, than the time that I saw her last night and it was almost blinding to my sights as the sun reflected off of it as if it were almost like plastic. Her hair was in shambles as it was unbraided and unknotted from the ponytail that it was in last night and her face was still snoozing away the minutes that kept her bound to the bed.

Now that I have completely explained and described the whole situation as well as given as much of a graphic explanation as I could about what I "SHOULD" have seen, let me just tell you now, this wasn't exactly what happened. Instead of me taking in her beauty and just sitting there watching her sleep, I completely freaked the fuck out. And, when I say I completely freaked out, I mean that I wholeheartedly brought this whole situation over the top. So high in fact, that it could've been put into any generic Harem anime and been made as a comedic scene.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" I yelled at the top of my lungs as I jolted back into the wall and slammed myself up against it.

In reaction to me being startled beyond any real means of reasonable comprehension, Miyuri slowly woke up from the loud noise and the sheet fell off from her chest that was protecting this story from turning into completely "M" for Mature.

"Mmmm?" She stretched out as if it was a question to her with her chest slowly heaving up and down from the sudden oxygen that filled her lungs. "Oh, good morning Kiritsu-san." Miyuri finally said with a slight smile. "I see _you're_ pretty energetic this morning." She continued, looking down at a certain area that I will definitely not explain.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" I yelled at her again, trying to wrap my head around what exactly transpired from last night.

"What are you talking about? You said that you were tired and you nearly passed out on me right there on the spot. You mumbled out your address to me and we made our way here. Since it was so late, I just stayed here." She explained as she brought me up to speed on what exactly happened.

"That doesn't explain anything!" I interjected. "Why are you in my bed, why are you naked and most of all, WHY IN THE HELL AM I NAKED?!" I exclaimed as I quickly jumped into the closet to cover up myself.

"Well to answer your questions in chronological order: You don't have another bed for others to sleep in, I don't like to sleep with my clothes on since it feels too weird and you were completely covered in your own sweat so I basically cleaned you up along with myself and we both went into the bed together." She said without missing a beat.

"Wait wait wait… what did you say?" I asked her as I thought I misheard that last part.

"What? You don't have another bed?" she asked me.

"No, the other thing."

"I don't like to sleep with my clothes on?" she asked again.

"No. One more…" I replied, fearing the worst.

"Oh. Yea, you were passed out and covered in filth so I washed you and myself in the shower and we both departed to your room to sleep." She explained with a smile.

…

…

"You… did what…?" I asked her with a completely anime-like shocked expression.

"I washed you." She retorted again immediately.

"WHAT?!" I exploded, making her cringe from the loud noise.

Thoughts started to completely spin in my head. I knew that if I kept thinking at this speed I would go crazy but things needed to be explained. Things that never should have happened at my age happened and I have no recollection of it. If I didn't know any better I would think I was in some sort of anime and this was the part of the manga where both parties took a shower and departed for the night like some sweet couple. I started to talk to myself at a very fast pace. I kept running through the scenario in my head and every time I came to the part where both me and Miyuri were both in the shower together. I shook my head and redid it in my head to try and make more sense of the matter. It never worked out well though since every time I would redo the events it would progressively get worse and worse until finally it was literally and ecchi scene that is never intended to be seen by the likes of 13 year old kids.

Before I started to bang my head against the wall of my closet, I finally heard the shifting of movement coming from my bed. Creaking my head to the left, I saw her starting to put some clothes on and she already had a bra on to conceal her chest. She took a quick glance over at me and winked which just gave me the shudders before I quickly shut the closet door and began to try and find some clothes for myself in the dark. I could hear her giggling on the other side of the door before finally she opened it up and let the light in on the closet.

"HEY! I'M STILL NAKED DAMNIT!" I yelled at her as she stood there in the doorway with her back turned.

"I'm glad." I heard her say as she continued to stand there, looking out the window. "I'm glad that you're still the same Kiritsu Kaizer that I once knew… even if…" I heard her mumble to herself that last part before she walked forward to give me some space.

"I will be downstairs making some breakfast for us both. Get ready for school since you're still on that crappy schedule." She said as she departed from the room and went towards the kitchen. I didn't have time to say anything to her before the door closed and I was still naked so I couldn't go running after her.

Groaning to myself, I did as she asked and quickly got on some clothes and put my things that I needed in my backpack before sliding down the railing to reach the living room. Across the way, I could see her in the kitchen with an apron on and she was cooking some eggs and pancakes. It was rather odd to see a womanly figure fixing me breakfast since my mom never did so for me. It was always me who made the meals and I would always leave food for the rest of my family since I never really was that attached to them. It almost didn't feel like a home because of it but I didn't mind it too much. We all had our separate things that we did when we got home and we were all on very different schedules. Actually now that I thought about it, I was wondering how I didn't know about her but my family let her in last night.

"Hey, Miyuri…" I started to ask as she turned around in her apron.

"Yes?"

"How did you get in last night…?" I questioned her with an odd look as she quickly went back to working on the food.

"Oh, would you look at that, the eggs are almost done. You'll have to ask me your questions later since I can't hear you over the skillet. Just sit down and I'll be putting this out on the table soon okay?" She said at the fastest pace I heard anyone speak at.

"W-Wait a second what do you mean by-" I was cut off again as she quickly flipped the eggs out of the skillet, over her head and used some sort of trick to make it land exactly on the plate that was placed in front of me.

"Now then, what was it that you wanted to ask me?" She asked as she sat down at the table with the pancakes placed right in between us. I almost opened my mouth up to speak my mind until she started talking again.

"Oh would you look at the time. I need to take care of some things around the house and you need to be off to school. Well hope you have a good day at school, I'll be here when you get back, please be sure to not wear your ATs in school and please do your best to make friends! Eat up your eggs and off you go!" She interjected at me as she pushed me out the door and threw my ATs along with the breakfast meal in a small bento at me.

"W-What the hell just happened…?" I said to myself as she closed AND locked the door on me.

'Well, looks like going back isn't an option.' I growled to myself as I turned around and started to make my way towards my school. Actually, to be more precise, I got on my ATs and started to stroll my way down to school, my way.

* * *

[Highway]

Zooming down along the highway at speeds that could only be conceived as a jet passing through at a low elevation, I rocketed down the large streets on the bridge and made my way down to the school on the telephone wires. This was the most ideal way to get to school within 10 minutes. In a usual car drive it would take a person a good 20-30 minutes if they were going the speed limit but with ATs, I wasn't bound by the grounded system of cars or trains. I was flying through the sky. The wind and the air was my road to my destination.

I zipped down the telephone wires and I noticed my school come into view. I knew that the bell would ring for the next period in roughly 10 minutes so I had to speed up if I wanted to get to my class in time. Contemplating on exactly how I should tackle this problem, I felt the presence of another rider near me.

Strangely enough, but not outside o f my expectations, It was Ikki Minami who was trailing right behind a little faster than me. He and I both knew that it wasn't the best time to do this, but I could feel it in his eyes and his ATs were saying the rest. With a quick gust of speed, he quickly started to catch up and before I knew it, he was right next to me with a wide grin on his face.

"First one to reach class wins?" I smirked with a devilish smile on my face.

"See you at the bottom of the telephone wires!" He replied taking off in front of me.

I didn't give him the chance to speed up ahead of me however since before he could reach his top speed, I was already passing him up with my fastest moves yet. I didn't know if I hit mach 2 or mach 3 but I knew that the sound barrier had to have been broken with how fast I had to have been moving. It was an exhilarating feeling. I felt like Icarus with wings on my feet. I could feel the air start to distort around me and in an instant it all vanished like I had entered a new plane. I had actually broken the wind barrier and with it an explosion of sound broke out behind me as if it was a bellow from the great titans of old.

As soon as I slowed down and landed on top of the roof, like I always did, I looked back to notice that the telephone wire I was grinding on had lit on fire and had started to incinerate from how much friction had passed over them. Ikki was landing right next me a few seconds later and he was holding his ears as if someone had put a microphone and speaker right next to him and had just screamed in his ear.

"O-Ow!" He yelled at me as he held his ears down. "That really hurt damnit!"

"What? I just made a sonic boom is all!" I said laughing at his pain.

"You fucker, I don't need to be going deaf when I need to go to school in the morning!" He yelled back at me as he punched me in the shoulder.

"Hehe, okay okay. I'm sorry. Next time I'll just slow down enough for you so you don't get stomped down so badly in a race." I replied teasing him with his inadequate skill compared to me.

"Oh. That reminds me." Ikki said as if he hit a revelation.

"When will you be joining in on the Parts War? I want to face you in a match and get you to join my team." He said with a grin as if he was looking at a prized toy.

"Sorry man, no can do. I have an obligation towards a team that I am trying to make."

"Oh really? Well that's a shame. How many people do you have?"

"2."

"2…?"

"Yeah, 2. The number after 1."

"So, you're telling me that YOU, one of the fastest riders that I have seen yet, has only two members that he has recruited on his team?" Ikki asked me as if I grew a second head.

"No. I don't have a total of 3 people. I've only recruited 1 person." I replied, not hiding the truth about my sudden hiatus on gathering more members.

…

…

"So… You're telling me, you've only got 2… of the 5 that's required."

"Yep." I replied immediately.

"AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Ikki started to crack up laughing. "Oh my god. You baaaaka."

"Hey, my one member and I could easily take out your team even if we are just two people." I said pounding my chest with pride.

"Oh?" Ikki replied, quickly regaining his composure. "Is that a challenge I hear?" He said with a fiendish grin as if he were a demon general.

"Oh, it's more than just a challenge, it's a match. I challenge you to an F-class battle. Your 5 members vs. Me and my partner." I declared, pointing at him in the chest. "You, my dear acquaintance, are so going down."

And with that, the bell rang and we both snapped back into our school reality. That bell namely signified one thing if you were still in the halls of the school: you were in the wrong.

"Fuck!" We both said in unison as we both dashed down the stairs and made our ways to our separate classrooms.

* * *

[Classroom 3-C]

Several periods passed without a second thought. Everything was just as boring as it was before but it wasn't that bad of a day in general. I was waiting with anticipation with each clicking tick of the clock. I would usually pass the time by just staring out at the window and not giving a rat's ass who was looking at me but, this time it was different. This time I was waiting on the clock by just watching it. I was watching the seconds timer hit the top of the circle every sixty seconds just so see that one tick from the minute hand move around and around until finally I got called upon in class to do something since I broke my façade of not paying attention.

This continued for the next two periods, which happened to be the longest and most boring periods of them all. (Yet strangely enough, all periods were the same time and each of them equally as challenging as the other.)

Finally after all the lessons and after all the times of me getting called up since I was now an active member of the class, school finally let out and I quickly laced up my ATs and dashed up to the top of the roof where Ikki usually perched himself since he had nothing better to do.

As I reached the roof and opened the two double doors that brought the piercing sunlight into my eyes, I looked over yonder at the far end of the sun-baked concrete and noticed Ikki and his other four members. They were all decked out in black leather jeans and black leather jackets that screamed "Biker Gang" but I knew almost all of them and their true personalities.

First you had Ikki, a self-proclaimed badass with too much testosterone in his body for three people to handle. Next in line was Kazu, a fast rider with a reclusive back story and little to no backbone when it came to making final decisions. Next to him was his best friend Onigiri. A fat, fat man with only one AT that was placed on his head for whatever reason that was and probably one of THE most perverted pigs on the earth and probably ever in existence. Further down towering behind the whole bunch was Buccha, the former leader of an E-Class AT team that Ikki defeated by a hairline snatch n grab. Finally last and certainly not least, sitting in the back corner out of sight and still cursing to himself at the stupidity of his team members was Agito, AKA the Fang King. This person shocked me the most for being in his team since he didn't seem like the type of person to fall in line with others due to his temper and his lack of playing nice with others. Adorned on each and every single one of their backs was the logo of what looked like a crow or a sign or some sort of etch sketch crap that looked as if a 5-year-old drew it. Emblazed on the bottom was the team name: KOGARASUMARU.

"Well, I see all of the idiots gathered." I jeered at them as I walked up to them.

"Well at least I have a team. I see you still don't have your other team member with you." Ikki replied as he sneered at me with a 'Holier than thou' expression.

"Oh, don't worry." I said with a smug look. "If I really wanted to I could out-run all of you with ease. I just want to prove to you that the members I am gathering are the cream of the crop. The best you can get in any team and we're going to be the ones to dominate the Trophaeum Tower." I declared with a grin.

As I finished my thought I felt a cold gust of wind sweep by me and in an instant I noticed that Kisaragi had finally shown himself as he was now perched on the steel fence that was posted around the perimeter.

"Now how did you pull off that one?" I asked him.

"Third floor balcony. Easy access point." He commented as he jumped off and landed next to me. "So, these are the ones then?" he asked.

"Yes my subordinate. Do as your master commands and beat them all to hell and back!" I declared as he punched me in the back of the head to reprimand the comment I made.

"Go to hell you little asshole! I'm not your little pet that you can just order around." He grumbled irritably as he looked back up again and regained eye-contact with his adversaries. "W-Wait… is-is that?" He asked himself as if he had seen a ghost.

I looked up and noticed what he had been so awestruck about and it finally hit me about why he was acting this way. He was staring at Agito, the Fang King that had shredded his brother's body into a little chew toy.

"YOU BASTARD!" he roared as he jumped up and over the entire group and brought his AT down with an intent to kill.

Agito instantly dodged to the left and brought his AT up into Kisaragi's face. Following it up in one swift move he swept his leg underneath Kisaragi and instantly tripped his balance which brought his face down into the concrete.

"You're still too slow you little shit." He spat at him as he jumped back from the bloodthirsty killing intent that quickly enveloped the area.

"You… You destroyed my brother's hopes. You destroyed his dreams and completely shattered anything that could possibly let him ride again! I'll never forgive you. I'll never forgive you, you little spit fuck!" Kisaragi yelled out before getting his faced stomped into the ground again by Agito.

"Your 'brother' is and shall forever be a part of my road. He wished to fight against me with no restraints. He wanted to face me like a true rider till the end and I granted him just that." Agito replied with earnest as he grinded his AT further into the back of Kisaragi's head. "If you want to bark and complain so much as to just blatantly attack a king in the open like a beast looking for blood, then do it like a real man and fight me like your brother did. Don't you dare ever face me again unless you're truly prepared to lose everything, understand?!" Agito roared back before slamming his AT down into the concrete making Kisargi's upper body fly up off the ground. He quickly turned himself around and spun his AT into Kisaragi's jaw which sent the man flying across the rooftop towards me and he fell limply on the ground as he was administered his punishment.

He didn't move immediately, in fact I wouldn't even call it a good long moment before he finally showed a sign that he was still alive. I was honestly surprised when he actually did start to get up as I could see the lacerations that were engraved into his body start to spew forth blood. He didn't seem to respond to me calling out his name but something in him knew that if he attacked the Fang King here and now, he would most surely be beaten back again.

He stood there, blood spewing forth from his wounds drenching his clothes and the floor he stood upon. In just a matter of thirty seconds, the pool of blood had spread so far that it seemed that he must've lost at least two maybe even three pints of blood. I couldn't stand there much longer with how much danger he was putting himself through but it had to be done. He had to do this himself since I couldn't do anything to help him.

I was interrupted in my awestruck state when I felt a warm gust of wind sweep by me and it started to envelop Kisaragi. He didn't seem to notice anything wrong with the situation that was developing right in front of his eyes but in a few moments I could no longer see Kisaragi and all I could see was a bright yellow light that had covered his body up. I looked behind me and noticed the one person I hadn't ever thought I would see at least, not so soon.

Hiyu was standing there in the doorway with his ATs glowing a vibrant yellow radiance which stemmed out alone the ground and it slowly trailed over to where the globe of light had enveloped Kisaragi. It looked like he was murmuring something to himself but I didn't noticed enough to make out exactly what he was saying. He took a few more steps forward with his ATs before he finally broke eye contact with the orb of light and looked over at me.

"Well, how's your day going so far Kiritsu?" He asked me with an innocent smile.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing Hiyu?" I replied back with venom in my words.

"I'm healing your partner who looked like he was about to die from severe blood loss." He instantly shot back at me as if anticipating the question. "And by the looks of it, if I hadn't followed my gut feeling and gone up here he would have been in grave danger." He followed up before trailing off again in his murmuring to himself.

Since he was so close to me this time, I was able to hear what he was saying but it was too wordy and way too fast to discern out exactly what he was talking about. I heard some bits and parts about body temperature as well as regeneration and activity of cells so based off of that it must have been his way of analyzing the status of his 'Patient' while in the globe. After another 30 seconds of him murmuring to himself and watching the orb twitch and spring forth as if it were coming alive, the apparition in front of me started to dissipate revealing Kisaragi in a knocked out state. As the orb completely vanished, Kisaragi fell like a rock and hit the ground in a sleep-like state and soon he woke up from the sudden jolt of energy that hit his body.

"W-What the hell?!" He rang out of his mouth as he jumped back up onto his feet as if he just woke up from a bad dream.

"Welcome back to your sanity." I commented before he turned around and swung his leg at me.

"I don't need to hear that from you, you schizophrenic retard." He jabbed back at me as he regained his composure.

"Do you even know what that word means?" I asked him as he looked back over at Agito. "H-Hey! Don't do anything stupid you idiot-"

"I'm not going to attack him. I know exactly what I did and what I need to do now." He replied as he quickly jumped up and over the railing and disappeared from view over the side of the building.

"He's a rowdy one." Ikki commented before looking over at Agito. "Oy, you and I got some things to talk about once we're done here." He said before looking back at me. "So: Do you still plan to face us in an F-Class match?" He asked me as if I was considering backing down.

"No, in fact I wouldn't think that Kisaragi would allow me to decline this match if it meant that he could beat Agito in a match of ATs." I replied before looking over at Agito. "You know, you could've at least gone a little easier on him." I said with a shrug.

"Fuck off. The baka had it coming and he wasn't about to just let me go unscathed if I didn't go serious against him. Just count yourselves lucky that I didn't go all the way and rip him to shreds." He spat back at me as if I was a target for his rage. Actually, now that I think about it, it probably wasn't that far off from the mark.

"Alright well it's good to hear that you're not going to back down however, you still need a total of five members to participate in the match. I asked some people and they've all said that you need to have a full team in order to have an official match." Ikki jumped in on the conversation, trying to get everyone back on track.

"But we're not going to have an official match. We're only here to beat your team." I rejected.

"Yeah that's true however, if you get yourself a team and beat us in an F-Class match then it goes towards points in order to advance. I want to become the best storm rider that anyone has ever seen. I'm going to make Kogarasumaru the best AT team to have ever toppled the Trophaeum Tower." Ikki said before staring at the sky with his hand outstretched. "I'm going to fly. I'm going to show everyone that anyone is able to fly."

'Hehe. If only I could be like him.' I thought before regaining eye-contact with Ikki. 'But it's not possible. I'll need to walk a different path from him.' I thought to myself as I stared off into the distant clouds behind Ikki.

"Alright, I see you really want to do whatever it is you can in order to achieve your goal so I'll meet your expectations. I will meet you at the designated area to start the F-Class match. This is going to be for the record, may the best man win." I declared before jumping up and onto the fence. "Ikki, the next time we meet, we're going to be rivals." I said before looking over at Hiyu with a steely gaze.

"I thought we were already rivals you baaaka." Ikki replied back by sticking his tongue out and flipping me off with the bird. And with that, I fell backwards off the fence and out of sight. I knew what I would need to do in order to get my five members, now it was just a matter of dragging them along.

* * *

[School Courtyard, 6:30PM]

There was a rather large turnout at the match tonight. I think everyone was pumped up to see two upstart teams each with a known "King-class" rider with them and it would be interesting to find out who would win. On one end you had Agito, the Fang King a part of Kogarasumaru. On the other end you had Black Panther, the Ice Queen.

It turns out that while I was at school, Miyuri did her homework and did research on Kogarasumaru and found out where I went to school. Some way or another she overheard our conversation about our match and wanted to be a part of my team and with little to no time at all she had already figured out my designated team name and even made jackets for our five team members even though there were only four of us that had gathered at the courtyard. So, you may ask: "How in the hell did she pull all of this off?" The answer is: I have no fucking clue. In fact, it's probably better if I didn't know because I'd rather not get killed in my sleep.

Regardless, we were all standing there. It was Me, Kisaragi, Miyuri and a newcomer who was about as stealthy as me in class. His name is Daisuke Izumi, a classmate. He wasn't much of a talker and he was seated in the way back with no real discernable features since he was just naturally a quiet and chameleon-like person. Since he was so good at being stealthy, he was always called upon but always missed since he never said anything and it didn't seem like he gave a shit about it since he still had good grades and was still actively participating in the class even though no one ever noticed him. It didn't exactly fool me though since it takes a stealthy person to know a stealthy person. After I noticed he had a set of ATs in his bag one day, I knew that he would be a perfect addition to my team so I decided to drag him along against his will.

"You can do it Meimei-chan!" I heard his friend say as she jumped up and down in the crowd of storm riders.

"I don't need to hear this from you right now Fuuka!" He yelled back at her as his face started to turn red from the nickname.

"So, where's the other team that I've heard so much about Kiri-kun?" I heard Miyuri whisper in my ear. I immediately jumped forward and away from her as I felt her breath on my ear and I turned beet red the second I gained eye-contact with her.

"L-Look, you're going to have to stop doing that. It's starting to get distracting and I need to focus." I said trying to keep my calm. It was strange that I only reacted this way since I normally would've screamed at her for the sexual abuse but… I don't know I guess it was just starting to become normal for her to act this way towards me.

As soon as I regained my composure I felt a serious gust of wind spring forth from all around me. I could feel the presence of an experienced rider and I could hear the revving of the ATs as they landed in the clearing on the courtyard roughly 20 feet behind me. I waited for the wind to die down and before I could turn around to face them, Ikki declared himself as the overall best rider ever to grace our presence and he said it loud and proud.

"I AM IKKI MINAMI AND I'M GOING TO RULE THE TROPHAEUM TOWER! KOGARASUMARUUUU!" He yelled out as he and his teammates formed their signature stance. In one resounding phrase that could only be discerned as a pathetic attempt to scare the other team, they all screamed out in unison. "KICK THEIR ASS!"

Sweat-dropping at the comment, I turned around and looked at the retarded stance that they took up and started to bowl over laughing at how stupid they looked. I mean sure, it was awesome that they could come up with something like that and it got my mind going with what I could do with my team but it was just too funny to see something like that and I couldn't help myself.

"AHAHAHAHAHA!" I laughed out holding my stomach from the insane amount of laughter escaping from my lungs. "Y-You call that a stance?! AHAHA!" I laughed again before receiving a kick to the face from Ikki.

"Hey! Not cool you asshole!" I yelled at him as he landed away from me about 10 feet.

"Oy! I worked really hard to think up that stance and that phrase. It deserves your utmost respect you baaaaka!" He yelled back at me before looking up at my team. "So, this is your team then?" He said as he scanned through the members. I knew his eyes stopped when he reached Miyuri since his eyes started to glow white and his testosterone levels hit an all-time max since, well let's face it, Miyuri was one hot babe.

"OOOOOOHHHHHHHHHH!" Ikki yelled out before the wind of lust and power started to fill the air and his muscles started to bulge out from the sudden burst of energy. "I'M SO JEALOUS! YOU ASSHOLE! HOW DARE YOU GET SUCH A HOT BABE ON YOUR TEAM!" he screamed at me with a demeaning tone.

"Tch, it's not like I had a choice." I mumbled to myself before I felt the evil presence of Miyuri start to emanate from behind me. 'Holy shit, she heard me…' I thought before sweat-dropping from fear.

"Oh honeeeeey…" I heard her say as I felt the vice grips of death clench a hold of my soul. "You're glad I'm on your team right?" She continued with what I imagined as her sadistic smile of misfortune that seemed to shave years off of my life every second she wore it upon her face.

"Y-Yeah… I-I-I'm glad that y-you're on my team." I stuttered as I slowly creaked my neck around with the best smile that I could muster from the depths of my heart.

"Oh good! That's really good to hear!" She replied with delight as her smile actually seemed genuine and not just a declaration of wanting to slit my throat open.

I slowly creaked my head back around and gave a deep sigh to alleviate my anxiety. I looked back up at Ikki who was sharing the same dread with me and he slowly placed his hand upon my shoulder. He leaned in close to my ear so as not to anger the beast behind us and he gave his condolences.

"I-I know your pain brother…" he said with tears in his words. "Yeah, I know the feeling now as well brother…" He replied back with the same expression.

We both looked back up at each other and then back at our teams before realizing that we were holding up the entire group from watching a good match. We decided that if we waited too long we would start to lose the crowd. There was one problem though that started to resound in the back of my head and Ikki quickly decided to pounce upon it and ask the question.

"So, where's your last member?" He asked me as he counted up the members again. "I only count four people; you need five to participate in a real match." He said with a sneer.

"Don't worry. I said I had five people and I will be participating with five people." I knock back at him with a grin.

I quickly spun myself around and went straight up to Miyuri to get the extra jacket that she made with our team logo on it. The logo was rather simple. It was a wolf howling at the moon on a rock and on the moon, written in a sick ass font was the word "Shinsengumi". Needless to say, I was rather impressed with the quality of work that went into these jackets since each and every single one of them had the logo emblazed on the backs as well as extra designs that added to the "Badass" effect. The jackets themselves were of a rather light leather material and it didn't impede any movement. In fact it felt like they weren't even there. It was seriously light enough to be considered wearable in any type of environment and they felt comfortable enough to wear with any reasonable amount of clothing. Moving on from that thought process, I quickly dashed forward and jumped into the crowd of people that were gathering around the area. In roughly ten seconds I pulled someone out and plopped him straight down in the middle of us and handed the jacket over to him.

He wasn't that large of a person. He was 5' 10" with dark messy black hair with what looked like to be brown highlights and light brown eyes. His hair was long enough to cover up his eyes and he had a strange look like he was being kidnapped by someone. No idea why but it was entertaining to mess around with him. I asked him really fast if he wanted to be a part of a team and the second he said the word "yes" I pulled him out from the crowd so I guess that could be given as consent.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" He yelled at me as I handed him the jacket.

"What? You said you wanted to be a part of a team so I'm cordially inviting you to join." I replied by throwing the jacket at him. "Put it on, see if it fits."

"I was being sarcastic you baka!" He yelled back at me as he looked down at the jacket. "And I'm not a fan of wolves either!"

"Oh, you'd be make friend with it because once I see someone that I want in my team, I get them." I commented before skating backwards and re-establishing eye-contact with Ikki.

"See? There's my final member." I said pointing to him.

"I'm not a member of your team you baka!" He yelled again.

"Oy, what's your name so I don't have to just keep calling you 'You' like a stranger." I interrupted his though process.

"Like I'd tell you, you frea-" He was suddenly caught off guard and his voice stopped so I couldn't hear what he was saying anymore after that. I quickly turned around to see what would've stopped him from speaking his mind but when I finally laid my eyes on the situation, I wish I hadn't.

Miyuri had finally decided to step in and on his shoulder I could see her hand as well as a black and devious aura developing around it. It looked like the person was in pain but I don't think he wanted to voice his concern about it. I then heard him start to whimper and beg for Miyuri to let him go.

"Tell him your name then sweetie." I heard her say as she let go of his shoulder.

"I-It's Arashi… Arashi Watanabe." He muttered while massaging her hurt shoulder. "P-Pleasure to meet you." He said finally before donning the jacket.

"Well, there you have it. My fifth and final member is Arashi Watanabe." I commented before looking back at Ikki.

"Hell hath no fury huh…?" Ikki muttered in my ear. I nodded back in earnest. "Well then, let's get this show on the road. I doubt anyone else wants to wait for us much longer and it seems like everyone who was going to watch this is here." He said before jumping back to the rest of his team.

"We're going to do this like a real match. The winner gets bragging rights over who is the better team." I said before turning around to face my team.

For the most part, we looked like we were ready to go. Sure, there may have been a few hiccups here and there but it wasn't like we were going to just back down from a challenge. With a smirk apparent on my face, I spun myself around to look at my adversary.

"SHINSENGUMI! Tonight, we make our debut!" I roared.

'And tonight, we make it known to the world what we plan to do.' I thought to myself as the DJ overhead began the commentary of the match.

**Alright, I apologize for the late release so I decided to add in a little more to this chapter than I originally intended. Hopefully you enjoy the build-up as I will now move onto the bad news that I must deliver. I will be going on a small vacation while I move to a new location so I will be going on a temporary hiatus until then. Hopefully while I'm on vacation I'll have time to just sit down by myself with a computer that has Microsoft Word and I can start typing away but don't get your hopes up. Thanks for all the support you have given me thus far and please continue to give me your support for when I return and I promise that you shan't regret it. Thanks again and I'll see you all next time.**

**P.S. PLEASE R&R! IT KEEPS ME GOING!~ T_T**


	13. Where it all ends, Where it all Begins

_It's the first battle for the Shinsengumi. It's the first combined fight for any of our five competitors in a simple dash match against several opponents who could very well be far and beyond any of their skill levels and yet it doesn't even seem all that bad. Their hearts are their own, their feelings are their strength and with a tide of a hurricane at their feet, everything shall be destroyed and reduced to rubble._

I could say that I was nervous at the foe that stood before us. I knew I could see it coming but I also knew that this was the only path that I had to take on my road as a storm rider. I was tired of being restricted by an unknown system. I was disgusted at how they looked down on me with their eyes of hatred. They were scared of me and what I would become. Now, I am back and better than ever. I've made my team, I have stated my intent and now this is where the real fun begins.

[A few hours earlier]

"**AAAAND WELCOME TO AN EXCITING MATCH YOU FUCKERS! I am your DJ, your number 1 commentator! It's an esteemed pleasure for me to bring this match for you live and to any of you who are watching through your screens all across Japan, let me just fill you in. In one corner you have the upstart and coming KOGARASUMARU! They are lead by the strong and upcoming wanna-be King: Ikki Minami! In the other corner you have the newest team to ever hit the block: SHINSENGUMI! They are lead by an unknown yet strong and powerful rider known as Kiritsu Kaizer! Not much is known about this kid but from the looks of his team, this is sure to be an interesting match! But enough of what I'm saying and what I have further to say, Let's get this match on the road!"** The commentator roared over the crowd with his TV-like head. Actually, now that I took a "double-take" at his head, it really was a TV screen.

"Hey! What are you looking at you dumbass!" Ikki yelled at me as he was getting irritated by my stalling.

"I could say the same thing to you idiot. What type of moron would provoke someone of a higher skill just so they could get their ass beat?" I goaded back at him as I revved up my AT's.

"Oh? It looks like you're finally getting serious. Let's do this then!" He retorted back as he sped towards me with his fists clenched, ready to punch me in the face.

We both started our immediate approach to each other but before any one of us could land a blow, I found myself flipped upside down and laying on the ground looking up at the sky wondering what went wrong. My head was ringing and I could feel my skull cracking open from the immense pressure that was pushing against the back of my cranium.

"O-Ow!" I yelled out as I clenched my head. I soon heard Ikki behind me and as I looked over towards the direction of his voice, I noticed he was also in the same predicament as me. I was interrupted in my train of thought when I heard the commentator come up again over the speakers that seemed to be placed perfectly in every orifice around the campus.

"**U-U… Unbelievable! The Black Panther on team Shinsengumi has crippled them both! Let it forever be known that this woman is not someone you want to piss off!" **The commentator roared over the microphone as he witnessed the entire scene.

"O-Ow…" I groaned as I slowly sloped up into a crouched resting position. "D-Did you have to flip me Miyuri…?" I asked her as she finally came into my vision.

"Yes. Yes I did. You almost cost us the match due to your behavior. Granted, it probably would have been up to debate on who started the fight but it wouldn't have done us any good. You started an official match in the Parts War and as such you need to follow by the rules or we're going to get disqualified." She explained as she patted her hands against themselves as if wiping away the imaginary dirt that was protruding off of her skin.

"But…" I thought as I went over what she just said. "…Didn't you technically hit me AND him?" I asked her as if she went against her own reasoning.

"No. I just redirected both of your attacks and you both lost your balance since you went straight downward at a 90 degree angle." She retorted again as if she expected the question.

"Uh huh…" I nodded to myself with my jaw slightly ajar at the nonsensical idiocy that was laid bare before me.

Oh well, either way she was right. If we had gone against the original rules that we set for this fight, we surely would have been disqualified regardless who started it.

I groaned in anger to myself as I slowly brought myself up back to my standing position. Ikki was still on the ground as if he was bored of the whole thing and before I could do anything to get him up, Agito intervened and kicked him in the gut so hard that he toppled back over to his team across the ground.

"Dumbass." He spat on the ground as if in pure disgust at his 'leader.'

"Alright then since you're already away from your group and already at the start line, how about we start off with Agito and Kisaragi?" I offered to Agito since he was just about to start heading back to his group.

"I'm not fighting against the wuss." He commented before turning back to strolling over to his group. He was quickly interrupted in his movement however when Kisaragi leapt into the air and descended quickly to the earth, pounding the ground in front of Agito leaving a nice small crater where the impact was, no more than 5 feet away from where Agito was standing.

"Don't count me off as some stupid kid. I'm here for revenge and you're going to pay whether you want to or not." He growled at him as the wind around him started to glacially vibrate.

"You're not even worth my time _kid_." He emphasized as if to downgrade him from 'fucker.'

"Then it looks like I win against you, _fish._" Kisaragi jabbed back as if to he would get a reaction out of something as simple as an insult.

"My nickname… is _Shark._" Agito retorted back as if he was truly agitated by the comment.

'U-Unbelievable…' I thought to myself as I sweat-dropped to the over-reaction that I was not expecting from the Fang King.

"The way you're acting isn't that of a shark. It's the actions of a cowardly sheep." Kisaragi commented.

It sent Agito over the edge. So far in fact that he jumped back and started to rev up his AT's so ferociously that the ground beneath them started to crack from how much friction was destroying the earth.

"Hurry up you little shit. I'll make it so that you can't even bear to look at AT's again." He growled as he bent his knees slightly, ready to take off.

Kisaragi quickly took his place beside the Fang King and glared at him as if he wanted to chomp his face off for dinner. He wanted to tango in deep waters, now it seemed that he was way in over his head. The commentator quickly started his countdown as if he was ready for a bloodbath to happen. As the numbers reached down to three, I could feel my heart start to sink. This would be where he would show his worth. This is where Kisaragi would have his hardest in all his life and I was actually scared that he wasn't going to make it out of this match alive. I didn't have much more time to worry for him because before I knew it, they were nothing more than dust marks in their starting zones. They had already turned the corner and before I could gain a visual on how far they had travelled, they were already behind the school district and out of sight.

The rules of dash were rather simple: Stay on the track and reach the goal.

It was rather simple rules since anything was fair game. It didn't matter what you had to do, all you needed to do was just stay on the track and reach the goal. This track in particular was rather easy since it was mainly two different paths that circled around the entire campus. At some points they would intersect and become one but about half of the track was separated into two and it would allow two people to ride side-by-side before connecting up again. This made it so passing each other would be rather simple and it would make for a much more interesting match. This was rather bad though since it would provide the perfect balance between, well; balance, fighting prowess and speed to combat upon these two tracks.

My worst fears soon came to fruition when I stopped and focused purely on my hearing capability. I could hear the distinct sounds of metal grinding up against metal and soon it changed to metal being grinded upon flesh. I couldn't tell who was imbedding their AT's into who but I knew that someone was getting thrashed to pieces by the destructive power of the AT's. It was soon thereafter that I heard the painful scream of one of them. It was heart-wrenching to not know who.

I quickly dashed past my team and over the crowd that was blocking my path. I dashed forward as fast as I could and turned the corner to see shards of glacial flakes riddled throughout the area. It was snowing slightly where the incident took place. There were streaks of blood painted upon the walls and drips of blood could be seen splattered upon the cherry blossom tree that was just close enough to be drizzled upon. As I look farther down the track, I finally noticed him.

He was planted into a wall with searing marks that looked as if they were lacerations of a whip owned by a slave driver. His eyes had no pupils. There were no blue irises to be found in those hollow eyes as he had now lost all of his consciousness. All there was was a pool of blood emanating from his back and dripping down upon the brick wall and slowly but surely seeping into the plants beneath. Before I could see if he was alright, I heard the coughing of another person right below the cherry blossom tree.

"D-Damn fucker… You try too hard…" I heard him mutter before falling over to reveal his identity.

It was Agito who was underneath the tree. It looked as if he had been suffering from severe windchill and it looked like he was going to die at that rate if he didn't get medical assistance. Frostbite had completely covered him arms and his purple fingers had swelled to such a degree that it looked as if they would need to be chopped off. It wasn't as bad as I thought though when I saw his breathing start to pick up again. At least he was alive, at least he was breathing. That's a lot more than I could say for-

I was cut off in my train of thought when I noticed that the body was now missing. Kisaragi hadn't regained consciousness that quickly. There was no way something could still be considered human after suffering so much damage. There was no way. However, it was standing right in front of me. He was battered and bloodied. He was standing and yet not. He was ragged and tired and all I could see in him were the last wisps of fire that would be considered his life force. He was the walking dead and he was struggling to stay up on his willpower alone.

"G-Get… up…" He groaned at the half-frozen body that lay before him. "G-Get… up… you s-sack of shit…" He muttered again as he took a step forward.

As he motioned his way over, with each step he took, another good portion of his blood fell to the ground. I wanted to stop him with each step he took but I was afraid that if I even took too heavy of a breath on him, he would collapse and die from the outside force. Regardless of how much blood he was losing though, he moved forward and finally shuffled his way over to his final destination and he knelt down onto both knees with a hear sinking thud. He looked down at the human popsicle that lay before him and placed his bloodied hand upon his cheek before stopping completely. He stood there for another 10 seconds… 15 seconds… 20 seconds… 30 seconds… a minute. I finally stopped waiting on him to react when I finally got up and made my way safely over to him, making sure not to touch him or injure him in any way so nothing would happen to him.

It was then that I finally realized, he had completely lost his consciousness and was breathing in slowly as if he was sleeping. With a relieved sigh, I started to bring my hand up to his shoulder so I could support him but I was immediately grabbed by his right hand and his eyes snapped open. With his blood-shot irises focused on me, he stared at me and pulled me in close so he could whisper two words into my ear.

"D-Don't… L-L-Lose…" he muttered before finally losing all of his strength and falling over like a limp piece of flesh.

Looking down at him, I noticed a small smile protruding from the confines of his bloody mess that could be called a face and I started to crack up laughing at the comment. I couldn't contain myself from my laughter and to most people it would seem a little cruel and unusual however, for me it was a revelation that was reestablished in me.

"Hahaha… don't worry Kisaragi. I was never intending to win in the first place. Then again, I wasn't intending to lose either." I commented with a sadistic grin as I got up and made my way back to the start line of the match. As I made my way back over, I looked up into the sky and noticed that a storm had started to brew overhead. I knew that Kisaragi and Agito would be fine since the medical teams nearby had started tending to their wounds but I was honestly wondering how my other two team members were going to fare now that they had to deal with Buccha of the Yaoi and Kazu, Ikki's right hand man. I knew Onigiri would be chosen by Miyuri since she loves to torment the lustful ones and it would be a rather entertaining fight but it would be saved for sometime down the road.

As I finally reached my team again, I noticed that the next match was already underway, or at least it should have been but it quickly ended when Buccha completely fell off due his obscene weight on one of the smaller and thinner railings which chalked up another win for the Shinsengumi. Needless to say, it was rather entertaining. Slightly proud of himself and yet still a little shaken at how he almost got steamrolled over by a tank, Daisuke rolled his way back over to the rest of the team and took a seat down on the bench, trying to fall into the background so as not to draw any attention.

I laughed my ass off at the end of his match and I started to laugh harder since it was now Onigiri's turn to fight-, ah I'm sorry… It was Onigiri's turn to get mauled by Miyuri and her devilish ways. I almost couldn't watch as the voluptuous Miyuri snapped her neck to the side and gave Onigiri such a sweet and innocent smile that Onigiri literally turned into a pile of mush.

"O-Onigiri…?" Miyuri asked the puddle of a boy as he slowly started to form himself up again. "I… I don't want to fight against you. Would you please forfeit?" She asked as she batted her eyelashes at him. "I… I'll show you something special and secret to only you if you do." She ended him with that last statement as he immediately reformed into his original appearance with his hand held straight up towards the sky. With one resounding grunt of lust and pervertedness he screamed out.

"I FORFEIT MY MATCH!" He declared with his eyes turning into fire balls as he now awaited patiently for his reward.

Immediately following his declaration, Kazu smacked him so hard in the head that it nearly knocked him out and with one full-weight thud, he fell to the ground on his knees and clench his cranium for what surely would have knocked out anyone else.

"You dumbass!" Kazu yelled at him as Kogarasumaru was now down to two losses and one tie. If they wanted to win, they would have to win both of their matches and then it would be up to the audience on who actually won the F-Class Match.

Looking over at his opponent, Kazu had set his keen eye on his target and started to stare him down. Unsure as to how to respond, Arashi looked over at me and then looked back at Kazu.

"I-Is he looking at me?" He commented as he looked back at me for confirmation.

"What do you think idiot?" I retorted as I was looking down at my number one target this entire night.

"What? I have to fight this beanie bag headed mop face?" He insulted Kazu as he shrugged off the piercing stares he was receiving.

"Yes. You have to face him since I'm the only one who has a real chance against Ikki." I commented as I didn't remove my gaze from Ikki as we dead-locked our eyes.

"You know, if you keep that up you're going to be considered gay right?" He responded as he started to make his way towards the start line.

"It's not gay if it's with intent to completely dominate the person you're staring down." I retorted back as both Kazu and Arashi took their positions.

"I couldn't agree more with that." Ikki stated as he started to roll his way over towards me. "I've been itching to face you seriously ever since this morning… no even before that. Ever since I first saw you ride against Kisaragi, I've wanted to test my skills against you." He said as he stopped dead in his tracks, no more than a few feet away from me.

"Well then, that makes two of us." I grinned sadistically as both Kazu and Arashi started to rev their AT's.

I didn't notice at first but when it finally caught my attention, I noticed that Kazu took a knee and it seemed that he was going to start off in that position. It was a rather interesting gamble. On one hand, you had a great starting advantage since you could instantly pick up speed and rocket out at the beginning of any launch. On the other side of the coin though, if you couldn't stop your forward descent into the ground, you would topple over yourself and most likely fracture your neck with how much pressure you inflicted upon your face. Either way, it was going to be interesting to see how Kazu and Arashi measured up to each other.

With the countdown initiated and it slowly trailing down to the last few seconds, I could feel the tension in the air as both Storm Riders started to rev their AT's to their maximum. As soon as the timer hit zero, I didn't see much of anything else. Both riders instantly took off at an insane speed that left scorch marks from their initial rocketing launch off. Strangely enough, Kazu didn't fall face forward and kept himself perfectly balanced through the whole forward momentum. It was a rather impressive feat since he nearly skidding his cheek across the pavement but just barely stopped it from making contact with the ground. As soon as he stopped his forward descent and leveled himself out, he pushed forward past Arashi and instantly gained the lead and some distance from Arashi before they both finally turned the corner and were out of sight. Something strange happened though before they both turned the corner. Behind Kazu I could see something form behind him as if it was a shadow. I wasn't exactly sure what it was but it looked like to be some sort of jet or even an aircraft from an aircraft carrier.

Shaking my head slightly, I lost sight of the after-image and in almost no time at all, I could hear the grinding of metal upon metal and I could hear the revving of the small motors as they both rocketed through the course. As soon as I notice one of them turn the corner, I could tell who was going to win.

Bursting out from the side of the building, I could see Kazu's gray hair flowing through the wind as the speed of his initial take off had blown the hat clear off. Trailing right behind him, no more than a few feet, was Arashi. It was to be expected since Kazu took the gamble and won the initial launch but it wasn't all that bad. As soon as Kazu crossed the finish line, he jumped up into the air and landed upon the outside wall where the initial crowd had decided to perch themselves to get a good view. With one finger pointed up to the sky, he yelled to the top of his lungs in glee.

I glanced over at Arashi who was panting heavily. He tried his best to catch up to Kazu after he made his initial gap in the race but it just wasn't enough to pull home the win. Either way; he showed a lot of heart and just from that, I knew that he wanted to be on this team. I decided to roll up next to him and give him a pat on the shoulder.

"And I thought you said that you didn't want to be on this team?" I jabbed at him as he started to turn red a little.

"I-I-I just hate losing. I don't want to settle for anything less than first place damnit!" He yelled at me as he looked back over at Kazu.

"Just you wait Kazu, you may have won this battle but you haven't won the war!" He declared as he stormed off into the crowd in a fit.

Giving a deep sigh I looked over at Ikki who, surprisingly, was acting patiently and was waiting for me to take my spot next to him as we would soon start the final part of the F-Class Match. I decided to take in a deep breath before rolling over there and I looked up and around at the taller points of the building trying to spot Hiyu or Spitfire. I knew that they wouldn't miss this matchup between an ex-king and a potential king who showed an amazing talent at AT's.

Looking around and stalling for time, I dashed up on top of the first railing of the track and jumped higher into the school complex to get a better view of the area. I didn't know what I was acting this way and it wasn't in my character to look for someone or something that probably wasn't there. However, it was in my gut that I knew that Hiyu would show. He wouldn't be a true friend if he would just abandon his long time friend during his first match as a Storm Rider.

'At least… he shouldn't…' I thought to myself as I stopped at the highest reasonable point in the school complex and looked up at the moon that was starting to pierce through the night sky.

I didn't know what exactly I was waiting for. Was it just some stupid dream or hope that he would show? What would I say to him if he did show up? What would I do to him if he decided to show his face? Why should I even bother with associating with him when he took everything from me and made my life a living hell? All these questions started to cloud my thoughts and before I could start to get angry at myself from my repetitive questions, I heard the familiar sounds of AT's that I thought I wouldn't hear tonight. I felt a warm gust of wind pass underneath me and graze against the backs of my legs and with a screeching halt, I felt the presence of a person on the roof with me. He was standing roughly 3 feet away from me with his back turned to me. It didn't seem that it was the proper time to see him but I knew that I had to say things now or it would feel like I would never get the chance again.

"Hiyu…" I began as I kept staring forward, not giving any crack in my defense as I remained keeping my back to his. "I'm going to do what I intended to do from the beginning." I continued, trying my best to formulate what I wanted to say in a timely matter. "I know that things between us have gone all haywire and crazy in such a short time but… no matter what happens and… no matter what might happen to us both, I want you to remember one thing." I started to draw to a close as I could feel the wind in my lungs leaving me. "We're always going to be like brothers, you and I." I finally said before jumping down from the roof and grinding my way back down the walls before reaching the start line again.

"What the fuck were you doing?!" Ikki yelled at me as he finally lost all of his patience and was ready to fight me with his fists.

"What? I had to take a piss." I said with a straight face, trying my best not to show my tears that I could feel welling up from inside.

"Haha!" Ikki started to laugh at my 'honesty.' "I knew we had a lot in common. C'mon let's get this over with. I want to be sure to show you to your new team before tonight is over." He said with a grin.

"Over my dead body." I retorted before taking a fast, low to the ground stance.

As we both stood there in our respective stances, we both waited for the countdown to reach zero. I could feel my heart racing faster and faster with each second as it slowly descended down. I could hear the cheers in the background as they knew this was going to be one of the fastest dashes that they would ever see in a long time. I knew what I would need to do at the end of this match but I wasn't sure what to do once I would start to walk down my path. All I knew was that I couldn't stay where I was. I needed to get to the top of the tower as fast as possible and there was only one sure-fire way to get there. I had to challenge Takeuchi Sora and gain his attention. Only then would I start my revolution. Only then would I start the cogs of fate that would surely turn in my favor.

As the DJ counted down to three remaining seconds, I looked back up at the roof where I could make out the form of a rider. He wore a black leather biker jacket with a grey scarf that was sticking out from the opening at the top of the zipper. He wore dark blue jeans and the moon which shone behind him made his eyes pierce through the sky with their fiery hazel color. From his eyes alone, I knew it was Hiyu. Just from his eyes alone, I knew he would not hold back and I didn't want him to either. This fight had to be settled and it would end tonight. Little did I know that thing don't always turn out as planned.

As the DJ finished his countdown and the giant word 'Zero' hit my ears, I broke my stare with Hiyu and looked straight forward down the track. I revved up my AT's as fast as I could and I dashed out from the starting zone. I could feel the wind whipping around me as I became one with the road I was destined to follow. I could no longer hear the voices of the crowd around me. I could no longer see anyone else but the road that lay before me. It was just me, my road, and my opponent who was trailing right beside me with a grin that could only be explained as perfect bliss. We both smiled at each other before we both got serious and pulled out all of our tricks and moves so as to gain an advantage over one another. This was after all, the final match. This was going to be after all, the last match I was ever going to have in the Parts War.

As we both soared through the air on the road before us, I took one last look up at the moon in the night sky. It was a full moon tonight. It was the brightest I had ever seen it. It was glorifying our track with its bright light and it was the perfect scene to where it would all end, and where it would all begin.

**And with that, I give you chapter 13. Glad to see that you decided to keep on reading even after the nice month long break that I took from writing. Now, as I would think you all deserve to know why I took a break, I would like to let you know that I have moved to Japan and will be staying here for the next 2-3 years. I'm going to do what I can to keep updating this fanfic but there are no promises. Please be sure to R&R as it will give me the strength I need to continue writing even though I might not have time for it due to my schedule. Stay frosty and thank you for all your support thus far. I'll see you all next time.**


	14. The Rebirth of a King

I've never been much for words. Every time I try to bring them from my thoughts and put them onto paper, I've found them to be distorted and warped from what I originally intended to write. It's been forever obscure to me but then again, it's to be expected. I'm not much of a writer and I'm sure as hell not much of a poet however, what was going through my head was just short of it.

I knew what I thought was crazy. I knew it from the beginning. Trying to take on the system, regardless of what system it was, was considered crazy. Nothing is ever right when the system sees an opposition. Regardless of how much sense it makes, if it's seen from the eyes of the system and it doesn't coincide with what they want to see, hear or believe then it doesn't matter. It's a disease, it's the black sheep, it's the thing that must be cut out and separated.

"Hey! What are you spacing out for you idiot?!" Ikki yelled at me as he jumped over my head and started grinding backwards to get a good look at my face.

"I'm contemplating how I'm going to end you and win this race!" I yelled back at him as I jumped off the side of the track, grinded across the wall and jumped back onto the track a few feet in front of him. "If you don't start getting serious, this isn't going to be much of a match!" I stated before pushing ahead with more intensity.

I felt the wind whipping around me and I could feel the lashes of the gusts pushing through my hair as I ducked low to decrease the wind resistance against me. I didn't know where Ikki was now that I had gone straight into a tunnel vision but I knew he had to have been close since I heard both of our AT's running. There wasn't much to say during the match. We had our witting banter going back and forth but nothing more than that. We didn't want to fight like Kisaragi and Agito wanted to. We just wanted to ride. We wanted to feel free. We wanted to feel like we could do anything in the world and it was that sole, simple purpose that we rode.

I was interrupted in my melancholy when I heard Ikki scream at the top of his lungs of his exhilaration with the match. He wanted, just like me, to go even faster. He wanted to go even higher than before. He wanted with all of his heart the freedom that every storm rider wanted and then some. I wasn't quite sure what his intentions were nor did I know what he intended to do once he rose to a certain point in power but if there was one thing that I could be sure of, it was that I knew the AT world would be forever changed if he were to make his dreams come to fruition.

I snapped myself back into the match to realized an additional pair of AT's revving up behind us. I could feel the vibrations through the rails as they started to heat up with extreme amounts of energy coursing through them. In a matter of seconds, the railing gave way from the heat and completely melted into nothing more than a puddle of aluminum. Luckily enough, I was able to jump off the track and land peacefully into a nearby balcony that was sticking out of the school walls. I looked back over and noticed that Spitfire was the one who melted the railing apart.

"Spitfire." I commented while sitting on the balcony.

"Hey! Spitfire! Why the hell are you messing with our match?!" Ikki retaliated with anger as he was perched on top of the cherry blossom tree.

"I've come to warn you both. I thought I would drop by and let you know that Sora and three more kings will be arriving here shortly to… well for lack of better words, they're here to take care of this mess Kiritsu." Spitfire explained as he stood there on the semi-stable railing.

"So what you're telling me is… this would be the right time, if any, to show the world what I plan to do right?" I retorted as I started to grin my sadistic smile.

"Exactly." The red haired man said before looking over at Ikki who had no idea what was going on.

"Ikki Minami." Spitfire commented to get his attention. "Where do you stand on this matter?" He asked him as if he were identifying someone from friend or foe.

"What? You make it sound like WW3 is going on." Ikki started to chuckle as he looked over at me. "Well… I'm not sure if you call it a side but… I plan to go and stick where I can be the most free. This is the only way to go for me so that's where I'll stand." Ikki resolved himself as he looked back at Spitfire with a wide grin with one eye closed. "After all, I'm going to become the next king." He finished with a hearty laugh.

"I see…" Spitfire replied with a smile. "Well then, I guess it's time for us to bring an end to this play, wouldn't you say so… Blood King?" He asked me as I looked up to notice that Hiyu was no longer on top of the roof.

"Yea… I say it's just about time." I commented before hearing, no more like I felt the force of several storm riders of King Class enter the area.

I could feel it in my bones the pressure that was emitting from their AT's. So much that before I could even look in their general direction from where the pressure was originating, I heard them land right behind me. There were two… three… no… it was four sets of AT's that landed behind me. In an instant I felt a tremendous amount of killing intent seeping out from behind me.

Turning around, I looked upon 4 King/Queen class riders, each with a road to call their own. They were lined up as if they had been screenshot in an action film, ready to kick the ass of the evil overlord of the entire age. The first to start off the four was a large man. Not much of a man, more of a beast. Full of muscle, too large of a face and towering about as high as Buccha on steroids, was a man that I was actually unfamiliar with. He seemed familiar in the face but other than that I couldn't tell exactly who this beast of a man was. Regardless, he had an aura of both anger and destruction about him that didn't sit well with me. He wore a brown hoodie with white straps extending out from the sides. His chest was being protected by a black leather-like armor that covered his torso as well as his arms. His pants were of a dark navy blue color and he wore brown boots which at first didn't look like AT's but soon thereafter I could see the steam rolling out from underneath the boots which could only mean that they were custom-made to look like boots.

Next down the line was a boy, didn't look to be more than 15 years old and yet he seemed to be older than he presented. He wore a cloak which covered nearly all of his body except protruding from the confines of the cloak, I could see that his body was not normal. It was rather odd to see a mechanical-type armor that looked as if he himself was a machine. He had short spiky lavender hair with dark blue eyes and I swear I could've seen electrical currents and static electricity arcing out from his body. He, like the large man, was emitting the same angry and ferocious aura of a person who had been wronged and he would've liked nothing more than to rip off the person he was searing his eyes into.

Moving onto the third person, it was actually the first familiar face that I hadn't seen in a long time. She was standing at a petite 5'10 with a tight T-shirt and even tighter and shorter shorts. She was wearing a pair of white AT's which had a unique look about them. Her pigtails fell down to her shoulders and her glasses were placed into the V part of her shirt. She didn't have a killing intent like the other two but she certainly didn't look too happy to be here, or to be more precise she didn't look too happy to see me.

Finally, the last person standing amongst the four was yet another person I didn't know. She was standing at yet another petite 5'9 with the tightest outfit I have yet to see on a human being. She had formed her hair into two mickey mouse which stuck out of her head like two antennas sticking up out of a ship. In her hand she held a lollipop that quickly went from her mouth and into her hand and vice versa. Her AT's, just like the large man's, were of a unique stature. They were single wheeled in the front however they had two wheels in the back which could only mean that they were specially made to do a feature or attack that could only be used by those types of AT's. Either way, I would probably find out soon enough when they would decide to attack me… if they were here to fight anyways.

Looking at the line-up I sat there on the ledge just looking at them as they seemed to take in the scenery. It was a rather long silence before the large man decided to take the initiative and speak.

"Kiritsu Kaizer… no… Blood King, my name is Nike. I am the Gem King and am second-in-command next to Sora. As you can see, you're at a heavy disadvantage in both skill and numbers. I will have to ask you to come with us." The large man said with the others giving me a glare that would most surely freeze most opponents in their tracks. Then again, I wasn't a part of the majority of opponents.

Looking down at the four King/Queen class riders before me, I had two options available to me. I could either 1: Fight them and declare myself my own entity, threatening the existence of the order in the Parts War… or I could 2: Go with what their wishes were, most likely meet Takeuchi Sora and then fight him so I can then declare myself my own entity, threatening the existence of the order in the Parts War.

Both of my options sounded appealing but it didn't feel like I was going to get a choice in the matter. Before I could say anything, the young kid of the group decided to open his mouth and give his own option of what to do.

"Fuck all of that. I say we just kick his ass now and drag him back." He spat out as he revved up his AT's as if he was ready for a fight.

"You see, this is exactly why I didn't want to come along. It's because of ignorant fools like you that makes candy taste horrible." The girl in the super tight dress said before spitting out the sickening flavor that had enveloped her mouth.

"Okay you two… There's no reason to fight when we're trying to convince him to see things our way." Ringo said trying to bring them both to their senses. "Look… Kaizer-san, we just want you to come with us to see someone. We need to… confirm some things so as not to upset the balance that we've obtained so far." Ringo tried to explain to me so as not to anger me, or at least that's what it seemed like.

"Well, I don't know why you're trying to tip-toe through my minefield but when you bring up a name like Takeuchi Sora… you must know that from the apparent and giant holes in my past and from the things that I do know that I completely despise Takeuchi Sora." I replied actually feeling anger swelling up from within my gut.

"In fact… fuck it." I snapped.

I jumped off the ledge and landed onto the semi-stable railing. I couldn't just let this slide. I knew my prowess. I knew my capability and I certainly had the intent now to dish out my lethality. Swinging my leg up and across at head level, I sent out a black fang and knocked them all back. I felt the anger starting to swell up within me. The pent up frustration and energy that had been seething and churning within my AT's had probably reach an all-time high. Feeling it start to overcome me, I started my assault against the four riders.

Dashing up to Nike, I leapt up and kicked him in his face before jumping off of him to avoid a kick by the kid. It wasn't much longer until the girl in the tight dress had jumped towards me with her butt to my face and kicked me straight into the gut with both of her AT's. I was sent flying into the cherry blossom tree which made Ikki react by jumping off and landing on the railing.

"H-Hey! Kaizer what the hell is going on?!" Ikki asked, completely shocked that Ringo was a part of this situation. "R-Ringo! What the fuck!?" Ikki asked Ringo as if he was expecting everything to make sense once she explained.

"I… I'm sorry Ikki… I can't let you know just yet. You… you've still got a long way to go in your life as a Storm Rider." Ringo said trying her best to put forth what she wanted to say into words.

"W-What the hell is that?!" Ikki protested as if he was just slapped across the face.

"She's right Ikki… you're not strong enough yet." I intervened as I sat there in the tree. "You need to…" I started as I looked back at the kid who initially retaliated against me. He was already halfway towards me and jumping at me in the tree. I quickly reacted by leaping up and over him and repositioning myself so I was surround by them in a circle.

"You need to become a king." I finished what I wanted to say before Nike sprinted towards me and punched me with the hardest haymaker I have ever been hit with in my entire life. I felt my feet leave the ground as I went slamming into the school outer walls.

I was now within view of the entire crowd. I could see my team and the rest of Kogarasumaru watching me as I was implanted into the wall. I could see Miyuri getting angry and confused at what had just transpired. Realizing this, I quickly peeled myself out from the school wall but it was already too late. Nike had already closed the gap and he immediately sent me right back into my imprint crater and shoved me even deeper into it.

"O-Ow…" I muttered before getting kicked into the gut which sent me through the entire wall altogether.

"Hey! Leave him alone Nike!" I heard Miyuri shout out as she tried to kick Nike in the face but to no avail. I noticed right before I impacted the ground that Nike had grabbed ahold of her AT and sent her spiraling off into the school complex by redirecting her flow of energy that she sent towards him.

I rolled across the ground and finally stopped with all the momentum in the middle of the road. I was glad it was night time so no cars would hit me because it took me a good second before I was finally able to gather my bearings and get up.

As I slowly started to pull myself upright I noticed the kid had finally taken off his cloak and was about 20 feet up in the air above me and was coming down with an axe kick. I quickly side-stepped him and he landed onto the paved road and immediately broke the surrounding area where I was standing. It was then that he spun himself around and tried kicking me in the ribs but I reacted fast enough to grab him and hold him there while I punched him several times in the face.

"Who. The. Fuck. Are. You!" I said each word while punching his face in perfect unison. With my final word and subsequently my final punch, I sent him into the ground and proceeded to pin him down so as to get the answer to my question.

"F-Fuck you ya piece of shit! I won't ever forgive you for what you've done!" the young kid yelled back at me as he tried to wrestle himself free.

"How can I atone for things that I've done if I don't remember!" I retorted back, grabbing his leg and spinning him around until finally letting him go straight into a light pole. "I'm getting sick and tired of all the 'Oh you've wronged me, Oh you've got to atone for this' or even 'Oh, I will never forgive you.' I'M SICK AND FUCKING TIRED OF IT!" I roared out.

"Who am I? What is it that I have done so wrong as to bring out 4 of you fuckers to have to deal with me?! I'm going to find some answers tonight if it's the last thing I do… and I swear, if I'm not content with the level of information you can provide me…" I started to get pissed off as I walked towards him and held him up by his throat. "…I'm going to break you, like Sora did to me." I threatened the boy before spinning him around by his throat and slamming him into the light pole making it bend where he impacted.

I quickly reaffirmed my surrounding by jumping up atop the outer wall and I noticed that Nike hadn't moved from where he was originally standing. Ringo and the other girl were both still back where I initially encountered them and Ikki was trying to argue with Ringo about what had happened. I took this time to look over at the DJ who was currently spazzing out about the influx of so many king/queen class riders and he was trying to inform the audience on what was transpiring.

"Oy, DJ. I'm changing the rules up. I'm no longer going to fight in the F-Class Match. I forfeit my round so Kogarasumaru wins." I stated before throwing a flash drive at him. "Now that we have that taken care of, I want you to play the songs that are on that soundtrack. I feel like going all out tonight and I'm going to do it in style." I chuckled to myself before looking back over at Nike to realize that he was patiently waiting on me.

"**E-Eh…? Ah… okay then…"** the DJ commented completely confused at what I just did. He immediately inserted the flash drive into his portable speakers and immediately the song that I wanted to start off with had hit the speakers.

[Insert Music: Yellowcard – Light up the Sky]

"Ah… now that's more like it." I commented before putting my full attention on Nike. "DJ… this is an unofficial match. It will be me vs. the four newcomers that just arrived. I want no one to interfere. This is a battle that I have to do alone. Miyuri, be sure to protect everyone and get them to a safe distance so we don't get them caught up in the action. I'm afraid… I might not be able to control the entire battlefield and I don't want to worry about anyone else." I explained to them both as I noticed Ringo and the other female ride up along Nike and take up their positions.

"The rules are simple for this match: If you win, I will go with you to Sora and behave like you wish me to. If I win, you tell me everything you know about my past and we both go on our happy ways." I commented before looking back over at the kid who was just now getting up from his personal experience with the pole. "And as I explained with the brat over there… If you hold out on me with any of the information that I desire, I will personally make sure that you will be as broken as I was when Sora was finished with me." I glared at him as he slowly rose to his upright position.

"You… you asshole!" He yelled at me. "Don't you dare look down on me! I am Nue! The Thunder King!" He exclaimed as he dashed forward as quick as lightning and kicked me square in the chest.

I was able to block it with both of my arms but because of the insane amount of force, my feet left the wall and I flew across the air into the school building window. I landed on the tile easily enough but I was distorted soon after when Nue followed me into the building and sent an electric surge through the ground.

"Hm… so you can stop my AT's for a time." I commented as I could see the surges of electricity originating from the blue-eyed kid. "I take it then… all of the kings and queens have their own special abilities with each Regalia?" I asked trying to pry for information.

"Yes. That move was called '**Get Together.**' Every Regalia is in of itself, special. They're legendary pieces for AT's to reach their maximum potential. You currently don't have any so you won't be able to do any of your fancy shit." Nue explained as he was sitting high upon his 'high-horse'.

"I… wouldn't be so sure of that." I commented before feeling the surges stop and reactivating my AT's. "Just because I don't have a regalia, doesn't mean I can't do anything special that's attributed to just my road." I smiled my devilish grin as I brought my foot up and sent out another black fang of energy.

Nue quickly brought his metallic armored arm out and blocked it easily but the force of the blast was so strong that he was sent flying out from the building and was sent straight to the ground. I quickly followed after him by jumping into the air while going into a controlled axis spin. I brought both of my arms together and crossed them onto my shoulders. I was roughly 45 feet up in the air before I started to make my descent completely upside down while perpetually spinning.

"This is one of my moves that I made… Eat it! **Blood King's Endless Barrage!**" I roared out before picking up speed with my turns and send out several fangs of energy which turned from red to black with each consecutive swing of my AT's. Due to how high I was in the air and with how much momentum I gained, I was only able to get off about 10 strikes before I nearly impacted the ground. I quickly turned myself right side up before I landed gracefully on the ground while making a crater in the process.

A rather large dust cloud was all that I could see from Nue's general direction since because he only blocked the middle part of the wave, the rest of the wave was able to hit the ground creating a large fog of dirt.

I looked over at Nike to see that he hadn't moved. Ringo and the other girl weren't moving either.

"Why are you guys acting like this?" I asked them, completely bewildered why they weren't helping out Nue.

"It's not that we don't want to help Nue… it's more like Nue and you share the same trait: you don't want help from others." Ringo explained as I could hear Nue revving up his AT's again.

"If you think something of that caliber is going to take me down, you're sorely mistaken Blood King!" I heard Nue yell out from the dissipating cloud of smoke.

"Just wait for it." I commented towards him, waiting for the effects to take hold.

"Wait for what?! You to surrender?!" Nue yelled out as he jolted forward faster than ever.

Now, usually I would have taken the precaution to keep the distance between me and my target but I knew that the second he could move he would want to move as fast as possible to close the gap between him and I. It was all that was needed in order to trigger the effects and in no time flat, he went dashing right past me as a bloodied-up piece of flesh that seemed to have just sprung a leak out of every orifice of his body. Since he was already up in the air and moving at an accelerated rate, the wounds that I had administered to him from the Endless Barrage took their toll and made it impossible for him to execute his attack due to his strenuous wounds.

As he fell down to the ground, a pool of blood started to originate from his body and within the next few seconds, it looked like he was drowning in it. The girl in the tight dress quickly dashed up to the kid, mended his wounds by using some sort of bubbles to seal up the wounds and carried him back so he wouldn't get caught in the crossfire between me and Nike.

"One down, three to go." I commented as I turned to face Nike who had been patiently waiting. "Are you next? Or are you all going to start to get smart and take me down as a team?" I commented as I could see Nike start to grin. As we both stared each other down, the tracks flipped and another song started to play.

[Insert Music: Disturbed – Indestructible]

"You think that just because you took down a brat, you can call yourself strong? Come now, you haven't even shown any promise that you'll be able to beat me, let alone Sora." Nike stated before taking off the large piece of leather armor and ripping the skull-designed hood off of his head. "Come on, I'm getting bored of sitting around. Let's enjoy this while we can." The large man said with his satanic smile complimenting his piercing gaze.

"Hehehehe… Haha… Hahahahaha!" I started to laugh manically at the thought of fighting a tough opponent.

Based off of his build as well as his terrifying aura that he was portraying out, I could feel it in my bones that this was going to be one hell of a fight. He had arms the size of a gorilla. He had at least an 8-pack, if that's even possible, that covered his torso as well as two monstrous legs that looked like they could kick boulders uphill like they were fucking rocks.

We glared down at each other for a good moment before I finally noticed something within him change. Actually, it wasn't even him that changed. It was the surrounding area that enveloped his being that had changed. Lurking behind him like a behemoth overlooking its child, I saw a colossal beast of metal and fire. Its eyes were of the purest crimson and its teeth were as sharp as a keen sword. At first it looked like some sort of dragon however, it soon became something even more terrifying than the mythic creature of old. It looked as if the hell pits had opened themselves up and spawned forth this creature of malice and hatred. Nothing could be describable about it except it was the closest thing to a demon that I have ever seen.

Staring down the large figure behind the already large man, I took a deep breath to calm myself down and I reaffirmed my confidence by making eye-contact with Nike again.

"I… gotta get myself one of those." I commented, scratching the back of my head.

"What are you talking about? You already have one." Nike retorted, slightly confused that I didn't know of such things. "Unless… it's actually true that you remember nothing…" Nike thought to himself aloud as he took a glance over at Spitfire.

"What type of shit are you trying to pull Spitfire?" Nike asked the red-haired man as if he were threatening his life.

"I have no idea what you're talking about Nike… but I would be careful if I were you, it seems you've caught his interest." Spitfire warned the large man as he noticed me take a leap at his head with my AT's.

The man didn't move at all, in fact I think he intentionally got hit in the face. Why someone would want to get hit in the face with no defense at all, it would make no sense to me but hey I'll take the free hit. It was that I realized what was wrong with this situation. Usually a kick to the face like that would've moved someone off balance but the man didn't move at all. He was like a brick wall- no, even stronger than a brick wall. He was the immovable object that wouldn't be moved like a mountain imbedded into the earth. I jumped away from him in shock as I noticed the place where I impacted couldn't be found. It was as if he wasn't hit at all.

"W-What the hell?" I asked in astonishment at the impenetrable defense.

"As I said, I am the Gem King… My road focuses on defenses as hard as gemstones." Nike commented as he took a step forward. "And as I am as tough as gemstones, I can inflict just as much damage to you as if my fists were made of gemstones." He continued as he took yet another step towards me. "Now tell me, Blood King… what is it you plan to do?" He asked me as he took up a fighting stance, awaiting my response.

I looked over at the hulking giant as he took up his stance. It was a regular boxing stance with his fists fixated in front of him with his elbows bent at a 90 degree angle. I considered what to say in reaction to his approach but nothing immediately came to mind so I just replied with what just felt right.

"Well… That's a good question." I commented as I bent my knees slightly and started to rev up my AT's. "I think I'll just have to keep pummeling you to bits until I finally start seeing some progress." I plainly stated as I dashed forward and unleashed another hard kick to his side.

Once again, the giant man didn't move an inch and the blow to his side completely connected with ease but it didn't deal any damage… or at least if it did, he certainly wasn't showing any signs of pain. This time it was different though, this time, I felt my leg give in from the blow against the hard rocky abs of the man and in no time at all, I was in a leg lock with my thigh about to snap from the insane amount of strength that was being exerted onto it.

"I think I'll be taking this leg from you now, Blood King. You've underestimated me long enough. It's time to pay the price." He grunted as he applied an even greater amount of force upon my leg.

I felt something crack inside of my leg when he did that. It wasn't that bad in terms of pain and it didn't shatter or break bones but I was pretty sure that if I continued to let him crush my leg, it would wind up snapping like a twig. Realizing this, I used my free leg to hop slightly up out of his grasp and I slammed my AT into his shoulder which sent me out of his grip and tumbling across the ground. My leg that was nearly crushed suffered some damage since it was hard to lean on it now but other than that, everything was alright.

"Well, nicely done on getting out of that grip. I didn't expect you to find a way out that fast." Nike replied, slightly astonished at my reaction timing.

"It wouldn't be much fun if you were to cripple me here and now. I've still got some things I have to do before I can have something like that happen to me." I retorted back as I started to circle around him.

I knew that trying to attack him head on wasn't going to work but it was the only thing I was good at. I had a couple of moves that I could try out on him and it would most likely dish out some damage but I didn't want the populous to see it just yet, nor did I want to have Sora know that I had regained a sufficient amount of my prior strength. I weighed my options back and forth while I circled around Nike, waiting to see what the large sack of muscle would do once he was ready to do so.

"If you're not going to attack…" Nike started to say as he lifted one of his fists into the air as if he was going to pound it into the ground. "…Then I'll just have to make you attack." He said bluntly as he dropped his fist down into the earth making the entire area morph and crack open as if it were an egg.

The surrounding area cracked and eroded as if it were hit by a meteor. The outer edges of the impacted zone pulled up and arced inward to create a nice wall all around us. I couldn't see anyone else through the earthly walls but I could easily jump over these walls and get out if it were a problem. The walls only reached up about a good 10 feet so it didn't exactly matter that much but it definitely gave this guy an advantage since he was standing in the epicenter. The hole above was only about 5 feet in diameter so I could fit through it but Nike would get in my way if I tried to sprint up to him and try to make my way out. It was a perfect little trap that he had me in. A little bit brutal, but perfect for this situation.

"Don't you think… this is a little much?" I asked him as I knocked on the outer walls of the 'cage.'

"Now we can enjoy ourselves to the fullest without having to worry about you running away." Nike commented as he slowly started to approach me so he could still defend the opening.

I tried to move around him before he closed in too much but it was already far too late for me to try something to naïve. As I tried to dash to the side, he lunged forward and grabbed my skull. My legs still went forward but my head completely stood still where he had me so I couldn't do anything to escape. It was then that he slowly started to squeeze and I could feel the blood rushing to my head.

My eyesight started to fade from the increasing pressure and the sides of my eyes started to color in with a crimson red. My consciousness was fading and I started to lose feeling in my arms and legs. In the next few seconds, or what I thought was another few seconds, I was a limp piece of meat with my arms dangling at the sides.

"Was that all you had?" I heard him say to me as he slammed me up against the wall so I wouldn't pass out. "Come on, entertain me more. You're making this very boring." He commented as he pulled me out form the wall and slammed me back into it repeatedly.

With every impact against the wall, I could feel the surface start to crack. With every pounding of my skull against the damp, blood-soaked earth I could feel something growing in my gut. It wasn't fear, it wasn't anxiety and it certainly wasn't cowardice. No, it was exhilaration. Exhilaration for the amount of strength this one man had. The insane amount of power this person held in his body as well as the skills of an experienced rider who not only cornered me and forced my hand, but someone who was truly a frightening existence that shook the earth with just a single punch of his arm.

[Insert Music: Godsmack – I stand Alone]

With my excitement peaking at a shocking rate, my arm instinctively latched itself to Nike's wrist and it started to squeeze down. Nike, realizing that I was still conscious and alive, tried pulling my hand away from his wrist but it wouldn't let go. It was imbedded into his skin and the nails upon my fingers started to dig into his skin. As he struggled to pull it off, I felt the skin on his wrist break and blood started flowing from the wound. I could feel my strength returning and he devoted all of his attention and force to prying my hand off of his wrist and he finally succeeded in freeing himself by letting me go and kicking me in my gut into the wall with his AT.

"Interesting." The gargantuan man said as he looked down at his wrist. "How long has it been since I've bled…?" he asked himself as if it were foreign to him.

As I gained eye-contact with him, I noticed that I didn't have control over my body as my view shifted slightly as if I was tilting my neck slightly to the left.

"_What is your name._" I heard myself say in an odd accent as my head re-leveled itself.

"I could say the same thing to you, Blood King." Nike shifted himself as if he was put on the defensive.

"_You're not answering my question… I will ask you again before I decapitate you for your foolishness…_" I heard myself say as if in a demeaning tone towards the Gem King. "_What… is your name._" my body repeated to the man who took up a now defensive position.

"My name is Takeuchi Nike. I'm here to detain you and bring you to Sora." The man said to the new enigma in front of him.

"_Tell Takeuchi Sora that if he wants to meet me, he knows where I am._" My body told Nike as he turned around and jumped back up onto the balcony. "_Now if you'll excuse me, I have a world to change._" The alternate me said before jumping further up onto the building and landing on the roof.

As he started to reach the edge of the opposite side of the roof where all the other storm riders were patiently waiting on the ground, A large thundering sound impacted upon the roof behind him.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" Nike asked rhetorically.

"_Don't try me, Gem King. You're not strong enough to oppose me on this matter. I'd suggest you go back to your brother and stay behind him like a good dog._" My body retorted back, completely insulting and degrading that fuming giant.

With no more words to exchange between the two powerful forces, Nike sprinted forward with his fist pulled back, ready to pummel the opposing force into the ground. Quickly side-stepping inward as Nike was close enough, my body reacted to his presence and flung him over his shoulder which sent Nike flying into the air with nothing to land upon except the ground far below. It didn't stop there though, as soon as Nike was clear of the roof my body jumped up high into the air and came down upon Nike with an axe kick, enveloped in a torrent of crimson and ebony which impacted into his chest, penetrating his gem-like armor which protected him.

"_Know your place, you pathetic wingless cockroach._" I heard myself say as we descended farther down until finally impacting into the ground, creating a crater that could've been created from a small meteor.

It didn't look like Nike was going to be getting up any time soon; in fact I was going to be surprised if he was able to get up after that considering there was a large wound in his chest. I wasn't able to get a clear look before my body took control of itself again and started to walk towards the DJ who's mouth, which was digitally designed on the TV screen, was hanging ajar from what had just transpired.

"_You, TV head._" I heard myself say as I stopped in front of the DJ. "_Are you broadcasting this world-wide?_" he asked as he extended his arm out for the mic.

"**Y-Yes… We are broadcasting live all around Japan."** The DJ responded in fear as he handed over the mic.

"_Good…_" the man said before turning towards the camera that was broadcasting.

"_For all of you scared cockroaches who are pinned to the ground, for all those out there who have their wings snapped against their will… for all of you who have been wronged, who have been restrained, who have been hurt, who have been destroyed… I am here for you. My name is Kiritsu Kaizer. I am the Blood King and starting today, my Rebirth to power has begun. Takeuchi Sora, I know you are watching… you know where I am, you know what I'm capable of. The ball is in your court and it's time to play ball."_ My body said before crushing the lens in from the sides and breaking the camera completely.

Turning away from the broken recording device, my eyes set their sights on my team that had gathered to see what exacted had happened to me. I started to walk towards them when Miyuri stepped forward and started to look concerned at the look on my face.

"K-Kiritsu…?" I heard her tremble as she looked closer at my face. "I-Is that you?" She asked again as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing.

"_It's still me. It's always been me, and it will now end with me._" My body said before walking past her. "_I have no more use for you. Do with your life as you see fit._" He said, continuing his way past the entire team and proceeding through the crowd before finally fading into the darkness.

**Hooray! It's finally finished! Season 1 of Rebirth of a King is completed and I have all of you reviewers to thank for it. Thank you so much for keeping with me until now and please be patient as I am still trying my best to adjust to life in Japan. Know that I will be continuing this fanfiction in another story and I plan to continue this as long as people continue to read it. Hope you enjoyed the ending that I put on display and I apologize if it wasn't what you were expecting. Please be sure to R&R as it is what keeps me going and I will see you all next time :D**


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